Yes, they are in fact really crappy science fiction, but what can one do?

There's another large pile of books over there, maybe that one has a better selection?

Well, that's what he's here for. He starts unstacking them and reading titles.

Crappy romance, crappy romance, crappy romance with a nearly naked guy on the cover, Terry Pratchett book, book on recipes, crappy sci fi, book about fundamental maths half-eaten by moths—

Ooh, this one's pretty.

Intruiging. One-word title, obviously fantasy of some kind but with any luck it'll be slightly interesting fiction instead of just rambles about tarot and star alignments. He picks it up.

As soon as he does, the little lock clicks open.

Neat, some kind of pressure trigger?

Yeah, he's definitely buying this. He grabs the other book he chose, the terrible sci-fi, and digs two quarters out of his pocket and stands up to head for the checkout.

The bored clerk barely looks at the titles when he sees where the boy got them and accepts his money without much comment.

He starts walking home. Tricky to read while walking, so he fiddles with the lock. Does it click shut again if he closes it? If he holds the book a certain way? He taps the cover, does it sound hollow at all?

As soon as he closes it again it clicks shut and he doesn't seem to be able to open it anymore.

The book sounds and feels quite solid and not hollow at all.

Huh. Whatever's inside it must be a pretty clever little mechanism.

He finishes walking home. Once inside he tries to pick it up in the exact same way he did before. Same orientation, grabbing it in the same spot.

Click!

He puts his stuff away, shouts that yes he's going to do his homework dad, opens it to the first page to start reading.

Unfortunately there isn't a whole lot to read. A rectangular hole about twelve by four inches has been cut from all the pages, and inside it there's a pile of cards.

Well. At least he only paid 25 cents for it. He glances at the sci-fi, decides against it, then picks up one of the cards.

The card seems to be made of some hard material, something between cardboard and plastic. The side facing him has a drawing of a woman with the words 'The Windy,' while the other side of the card has some sort of squashed mystic symbol. The card that was immediately under the first one has the drawing of a young lady and the words 'The Through' on it.

Is it a tarot deck or something? He starts flipping through the other cards, reading names.

There are fifty-two of them, pretty varied in names if not in art (women seem pretty prominent, followed by inanimate objects and animals, and then men).

The Glow? The Bubbles? Seriously?

Whoever made these had fun with it, with at least a few of them.

...He should probably get the stupid English homework out of the way. Cards start getting stacked neatly in the book's hollowed-out compartment.

They will submit to this treatment.

The stupid English homework is quickly vanquished. He reads nine pages of the crappy sci-fi novel before needing to throw it at the wall and mutter about how rockets don't work that way. He'd go work on something in the garage, but he's still waiting for parts to ship. Hang out with family? His mom and dad are probably busy doing something with his oh-so-precious older brother. Snack? Not hungry.

What the hell, those cards are amusing enough to burn a couple of hours. The fancy diagrams certainly imply that someone thinks they're magic. He gets them back out, lists them one every two lines on the next page in his notebook after the English thing, and writes blurbs about what they'd do if they were items in a role playing game. The Through makes portals. The Shot attacks at range. The Glow... Is a flashlight? Some of these are way more powerful than others. He starts writing numbers next to them. Spell level.

This is turning out to be a decently entertaining way to kill time. Yay. He gets through most of the cards until he sees another useless one. "The Flower? Pff, that's level zero."

As soon as he says its name, it starts glowing in his hand, and then becomes a fluid that flows into the form of the lady that had been depicted on the now vanished card.

She starts dancing.

What.

What. "Um. Flower?"

She smiles at him and reaches for his hands, wanting to pull him to dance with her.

Various cherry flowers and petals start appearing out of thin air and slowly drifting onto the floor.

There are three explanations.

1. Some lunatic laced the cards with LSD or something then put them in a bookstore's discount sludge pile. And he didn't feel it until he said 'Flower'.

2. Someone is pulling an extremely elaborate prank on a random teenager, and managed to get into his room and slight-of-hand the card away without him noticing.

3. Magic is real. He has magic cards.

He holds out a hand to... Flower... To see if she has enough presence to pull him up from a sitting position.

She totally does, and she's actually pretty strong for an illusion! About as strong as a girl her size who's very enthusiastic about dancing would be, and she twirls, turns, pushes and pulls, and flowers keep appearing.

Terence is not a good dancer! But he's certainly trying. Wouldn't want to offend the magic, if it really is. "Can you do..." What even are some kinds of flowers. Kinds that someone doing an elaborate prank for some insane reason wouldn't have prepared for. Roses is obvious. Tulips? Sunflowers? "Orchids?"

She doesn't say anything, merely smiles at him and the flowers being conjured are now orchids.

The other flowers haven't disappeared, though, and they're accumulating on his floor.

He sniffs a few to confirm that they smell like flowers. And then stumbles into his desk - his room is too small to have much room for dancing, really. He winces and pulls his hands away. "Okay, this is enough flowers."

She stops dancing and looks at him, tilting her head in apparent bewilderment. Enough flowers? her look seems to say, How can one have enough flowers? She does stop conjuring them, though.

"Um. So, you're a magic card, apparently." He takes a breath, fails to think of a less direct way, and ask-shouts, "How does magic work?!? How did you learn it? Why did someone throw a magic book into the discount pile? Do you mind being a card?"

The very slight variation on her facial expression does not seem to indicate complete understanding of his questions. She extends her hands and conjures a bouquet of a variety of flowers, bringing it to her face to inhale blissfully and then offering it to him.

He takes the flowers absentmindedly. It is pretty, he's not too masculine to admit that.

The Flower... Doesn't seem very personlike. He suspects it won't be able to answer this question, but, "Are you a person?"

She shrugs slightly.

"I think I won't be too concerned about how you are a card somehow, then. Because the answer is obviously 'magic robot-equivalent'. Are your flowers permanent as in 'not going to disappear suddenly', are they magical in any other way than having appeared from nowhere, how many. Um." he stops himself, lest the room be filled with flowers.

She shakes her head when he calls her 'magic robot-equivalent,' nods when he asks if the flowers are permanent, and shakes her head at the question about their magical properties.

"Not a robot. Permanent flowers. The flowers aren't magical themselves. Got it. Can you disappear the flowers? Go back to being a card?" Because it's going to get inconvenient if the answer is 'no' to either or both.

She shakes her head at the first question but nods at the second.

"While flowers are nice, I don't really have many places to put them. Sorry. Please be a card, if you don't mind."

She obliges, flowing back into his hand.

He sets the card next to the other cards. He looks around at the flowers everywhere. He picks one up peeks through his door to make sure nobody will see the flower-floor and tries to feed it to his brother's hamster. The hamster nibbles on it.

He goes back to his room and locks the door and-

MAGIC! EXISTS!

-Clearly investigating the other cards is now his top priority, full-stop.

Well, maybe cleaning up most of the excessive flowers so his parents won't think he spend hundreds of dollars at a florist because he went temporarily insane is his top priority. But then magic and note-taking about magic.

After a little cleanup and recording what he learned from The Flower, he extracts a certain safe-seeming card from the pile and intones, "Shield!"

The card turns into a floating shield with a wing pattern much like what had been depicted on it, approximately half as tall as a grown adult.

Not much personality on this one.

Can he - wield it? Is there somewhere to hold onto? Can he control it by intent, wanting it to go over there?

Nope.

"Shield, return to card form."

It does.

Notes notes notes. If they all have personalities like Flower, playing around could be... Hazardous. Maybe it'll take verbal commands for all of them. Maybe it just needs practice. He gets to find out.

He turns out the lights and pulls down his blinds to try, "Glow."

A little green fairy appears.

"Hello, Glow. I think if all these flowers," gesture at the ones remaining laid out on his desk, "glowed it'd look very nice. Could you do that?"

She shakes her head.

"Oh. Well what things can you make glow then?"

She produces several balls of very soft light that start drifting onto the floor or floating around much like the petals did which disappear after several seconds.

"Okay, thanks." Notes notes. "I'm going to be getting to know all of you. Please return to card form."

She does.

Let's try something a little stronger. Real magic. Not that spontaneous flowers aren't magic, come on brain. Not in his room, of course. That's asking for something to get destroyed.

The cards go in their book go in his backpack goes on his back goes out to the garage gets on a bike goes down a bike path and then cuts across a field and into the woods a little ways.

Elemental power is classic magic. Definitely not firey. Earthy could be dangerous. Watery and Windy seem relatively safe, and what can wind do out here besides blow some leaves around?

He digs out the card and calls, "Windy!"

And this time, instead of a woman or an inanimate object, what appears is wind. Lots of it. Lots of it. A whirlwind, centred on Terry—

—and the cards start leaving their hole in the book, one by one scattered not by the actual physical presence of the wind but rather by some form of magic that seems to be sending them in all directions, flying away and away from him.

Whatshitnonono- He stumbles back, drops the book, and grabs frantically at the flying cards.

He manages to grab one- But only one, and then they're gone.

He gets to keep Windy herself and the Float.

He stands back up and looks at Windy, still in card form. "Did you have to do that? And... Still a card. Hm."

And the card, predictably, does not answer.

The book, however, starts glowing.

He clutches both the Windy and Float cards quite tightly. And puts one foot firmly on the book. It's not escaping too.

No it's not.

Something small and round starts pushing against the sole of his foot, as if emerging from the book's cover.

Cards go in a coat pocket, which gets zipped. Then he gets ready to grab whatever that is, and steps off the book.

It is...

...a plush bear!

"What's uuuuuuup!"

He blinks. He says, completely deadpan, "The sky is up." 

Then he gives a short 'heh' and asks, "Are you The Teddy Bear?" Despite there not being such a card.

"No! I am Cerberus," 'Kerberos' "guardian of the Clow Cards!"

"Kerberos. Ah." He glances around, pats the two cards in his pocket. "There may be a bit of a problem."

"Problem?" he asks, stepping off the book, which stands up and opens all on its own. "What pr—" He looks at the inside of the book and screams.

"It happened when I tried to use Windy. I grabbed The Float, but the others..."

"What."

"I don't know how magic works. I found the book in a discount bin. I accidentally activated The Flower. I got all excited about magic being real. I biked out here and tried to call Windy. Then they got blown everywhere. That's all I know about what's going on and I hope you can answer some questions."

"...Sorry I lost your cards."

"How can you have lost them! They will bring catastrophe into the world!"

"Catastrophe? If they're that dangerous how can they be left in a used book store for anyone to get! Instead of, you know, being handled by an expert who knows how to magic unlike me!"

"The book was sealed! Only one of great magical potential could unlock it and go through me!"

"Better than unsealed, I guess, but it feels like there ought to be some safer way. Nevermind. So. I myself have magic, it's not just the cards. Which are going to cause catastrophe, being loose."

"Yes!"

"Gah."

It's like something out of a manga.

"Can you catch them? I am not a fan of catastrophe."

"I can't, but you can," the bear says, looking appreciative of Terry's train of thought.

"Of course I'm the chosen one. Why wouldn't I be." Unless this critter's lying. He'll keep an eye out. "Well, it's gotta be fixed and you say I can manage the trick. How?"

"I need to make you into the cardcaptor. What's your name?"

"Terry. Terence Miller. I'd appreciate it if you explained this before actually doing it."

"You will become the cardcaptor, master of the Clow Cards, and will have the power to capture them."

"I have... A lot of questions. And knowledge is power. This isn't urgent on a scale of minutes is it? Will you answer them first?"

"Not minutes, no. What questions do you have?"

"What exactly does it change between me and the cards, does it come with any costs or responsibilities or drawbacks, does it lock me out of other kinds of magic, what other kinds of magic are there, why are these powerful magic entities cards of all things, can anyone else capture the cards, how soon will they start causing catastrophe?"

He takes a deep breath. "Those are the most critical ones."

Cerberus...

...looks a bit lost. "Er, can you repeat the first one?"

...Right, slow down. "...What does becoming a cardcaptor do to me in more detail than 'lets me capture cards'. I want lots of detail. For example... Ice cream is cold. That's not enough detail to know what ice cream is like. What I know so far is not enough detail to know what being the cardcaptor is like. Even if it's almost definitely necessary, I want to know more before actually doing it."

"It... means you'll be able to capture them. Because you can't capture them now."

"How would I capture one? How would I find one?"

"You will capture them using the magic staff, and when you become more powerful you will learn to sense them. But some of them are very obvious."

"Like firey? I imagine she'd be pretty obvious."

"Yes. The four elemental and the two aspect cards are the most powerful of them."

"Aspect..." He pulls out notes. "Would those happen to be The Light and The Dark?"

"Yes."

"Cool. Um. Say I find... The Jump, hopping around a park. How do I capture it?"

"You need to contain it and then use your magical staff and say 'Jump, I command you to return to your power confined, Clow Card!'"

He writes this phrase down. "And I get a staff by becoming the cardcaptor? Does being the cardcaptor do anything to the magic I have myself?"

"You'll become more powerful as you catch more cards."

"Okay. Last thing for now. Does being the cardcaptor have any drawbacks you can think of? Making me a target, preventing me from doing some kinds of magic, stuff like that?"

"I don't think so."

He pinches the bridge of his nose. "How sure are you that this won't come back to haunt me worse than the 'catastrophe'? And how hard are you thinking about it? Because you answered in two seconds, not enough time for a proper think, so it's not quite obvious to me whether you're taking this seriously."

He's pretty sure this guy isn't lying, at least. He has a bit of a sense for when people are pulling something. Not that reading body language on a stuffed bear is particularly reliable.

The bear looks offended. "Being a cardcaptor is a great honor! And I am the Guardian Beast of the Seal, I would know if there was anything bad!"

Oops. "Right, sorry, I'm just- Stressed. I found out about magic today, you know. Two hours ago."

He relaxes a bit. "And you decided to just try to use it, without knowing anything?"

"Yes. I was working under what I thought was the reasonable assumption that surely a magic book left out somewhere wouldn't be too horribly dangerous, and I still hiked all the way out to an empty field to test anything other than Flower, who I activated by accident, and Glow, who I activated to make sure I wasn't hallucinating. I need to adjust my worst-case-scenario thinking. But still, where was I going to find anything out? I don't know any wizards. So. I'm actually pretty glad you're here."

"There aren't wizards, just sorcerers."

He writes this down, too. Takes another deep breath.

He thinks for a little while. Preventing catastrophe, learning about and acquiring magic with the help of a slightly sketchy spirit thing. Or pretending he hallucinated today. There's really only one option, here.

"Let's do this, how do I become a cardcaptor?"

From the lock of the book, which is still standing, a small glowing ball appears, growing into a small key. "Key of the Seal, there is someone wishing for a contract with you."

Aha. Something he would have liked to hear a few minutes ago. He's beginning to notice a regrettable pattern. "What are the terms of this contract? Or is it just symbolic?"

"The terms are the Key gives you power and you use that to capture cards."

"Okay, sorry if I'm being annoying with all the questions, I'm just being careful. Is there any more detail than that? Do I lose the power if I fail to capture enough cards or anything? I think the answer is no, but should I be negotiating here?"

"You can't negotiate with the Key. Your power and the Key's will be one, and it will grow as you capture more Cards."

...He's mostly sure Cerberus is just bad at explaining, not out to get him. Mostly. "Okay, ready to continue."

He clears his throat and continues. "A boy! His name is Terence. Oh, Key, grant him the power. RELEASE!"

His surroundings are replaced by a black void, the only things present being himself, Cerberus, the Key, and a glowing circle much like the one on the back of the Clow Cards where the "ground" should be. A strong wind starts pressing against Terry as the Key starts glowing again, almost too bright to look at.

He stands, looking as confident in himself as he can manage, and staring determinedly at the Key.

The Key grows and changes shape, becoming a staff.

"Now, Terry! Grab it!"

The wind is stronger, coming from the magical floating staff in the middle of the circle, working against Terry's attempt at doing it.

Pink. What the hell, he'll take the artifact of magical power even if it's pink. Step. Step. Step. Grab!

The wind stops, the glowing circle disappears, and they're back outside. "That's it! The birth of a Cardcaptor!"

"Cool." He swings the staff around a bit, getting used to its surprisingly light weight. Then he reaches into his coat pocket and draws out The Windy and The Float, showing them to Cerberus. "So how should I start practicing using magic? The cards? Memorizing magic words? Meditation?"

"There aren't magic words, but meditation helps, and getting to know the cards well. You can use the card by throwing it in front of you and tapping it with your staff, then calling its name."

Any dire warnings to share? Of course not.

He tosses The Float forward, reaches out and taps. "Float!"

The card twirls in the air a few times before coming to rest on an invisible surface directly in front of Terry, facing him. When Terry taps it, it starts glowing and then becomes a floating balloon.

"Kero, Float can't answer my questions about how it works, can it?"

"No, it can't talk."

"What can it do? Can it make other things float, or does it just float itself?"

"It can make whatever you want float."

"Do I have to tell it to float things, or can I want them floated and have it work? ...Float, float my notebook!"

"Until it knows you well enough to anticipate what you want, you need to ask," the bear explains as the small ballon floats over to the notebook, becoming invisible and insubstantial as it does, and causing it to float without detectable mechanism.

He pushes the notebook around, then tosses it, trying to get a feel for how floated things behave. And having fun because MAGIC. That too. "Can Float make other cards float? They'd be a lot easier to catch flailing around in midair."

They behave as if gravity wasn't quite affecting them, the notebook booping around like in null gee. Should he ask Float to move the notebook anywhere, though, it will.

"It can, but what do you mean catch flailing around?"

"Like, make the other cards float so they're still. Then find a net or something. Or possibly Windy'd be better at that, but I'm a bit nervous about her since she scattered the cards."

"When you capture them they'll go to you by themselves."

"I have get close and shout that thing to capture them. My idea was holding them still before I'd captured them, to give me a chance to."

"Oh. You can't use the Float to hold them still when they're unsealed, it's too weak for that."

"Windy's stronger, though?"

"Yes, it's one of the strongest cards and can often be used to contain other cards."

"Cool. Float, bring my notebook back then float me. Don't quite float me completely if you can manage that."

The notebook promptly (and slowly) floats over to Terry, and then the boy himself starts feeling quite weightless.

Oh, wow. Weightlessness is weird.

If he pushes off from the ground very slightly, does he come back down eventually, as intended?

Yep!

Whee! He hops around for a little while. But- weightlessness is actually pretty disorienting.

"Float, I'm gonna see about Windy now, return to card form. Cerberus... Any advice for less cooperative cards?"

It returns to card form and into his hand.

"Less cooperative cards?"

"The powerful ones with strong personalities that might not listen as well. Like Windy, she scattered the cards. Or was that just because I wasn't the cardcaptor yet?"

"Windy is actually pretty mild-tempered and agreeable. I don't know why she'd scatter the cards like that."

"Okay, but." Not what I asked. "If I capture a card that just doesn't like me, will they make a mess with anything I ask them to do, refuse to listen entirely, or what?"

"They can't refuse to listen what you order them to do, once you capture them, but it's better if you make them like you, both because of how much power they'll give you then and how easy it will be to use them. Also because it wouldn't be very nice to them otherwise."

"That reminds me, to what extent are the cards people? Flower didn't seem to care when I asked. They can think at least some, they want things, but you seem... Smarter than Flower was. Unless I just think that because they can't talk."

He blinks. "What do you mean, to what extent?"

"They're not humans, they're not the magic equivalent of robots, they don't seem all that smart, I'm trying to figure out where to put them on the 'deserves ethical treatment' scale. Presumably near the top but you know more about them than me."

"Oh. They're... magic. Some of them can talk, and they vary a lot, but they're all smart."

"And I have to capture them to prevent catastrophe, but I'll try to treat them well anyway." Great, now I have a moral responsiblity.

He puts Float back into the book, tosses Windy out, tap, "Windy!"

This time she is a lady.

"Hello, Windy. I want to get to know you a bit. Do you want anything in particular from me?"

She nods.

"...Can you try to tell me what it is without using words?"

She spreads her arms, then gestures at the Float.

"Is that 'use cards a lot'? 'Use Float'? Am I on the completely wrong track?"

She nods at the last question.

"Hmm... Freedom? Cerberus, any ideas?"

"She's not usually this cryptic."

The Windy makes another gesture, indicating his staff with her translucent arms.

"You want me to learn magic? Capture more cards? Something to do with magic that isn't those two things? Or completely wrong again?"

She cocks her head at him.

"D'you think meditating will help, Cerberus?"

"...Do you mind if I give you a nickname, Cerberus doesn't seem quite right." Since he's not a giant scary three-headed dog and all.

"Meditation always helps in understanding what your cards mean," he agrees. "And this isn't my true form," he says, guessing what Terry's on about.

He looks toward the setting sun. It's getting chilly. "Windy, please return. I'll try to figure you out later, promise. Cerberus, I'm gonna go home. You want to come with or find someplace for yourself out here? If you come with me you'll have to try and hide from my family. They'd probably think you were some kind of animatronics I made as a prank."

"I can be very quiet," he says, and becomes as still as a plush toy.

...a floating plush toy.

"And not obviously magic. Would you mind riding in my backpack?" He asks, while packing the Clow Book and his notebook and pencils into same.

He promptly scrambles into it.

And Terry bikes home. How do you even meditate?

Eh, he'll look it up on the family computer. If he can kick his goody-two-shoes going-to-be-a-fancy-lawyer brother off it for two minutes.

Cerberus is very quiet and well-behaved in Terry's backpack.

When he gets home he has a short conversation about the imminent family dinner and where were you honestly, then rushes up to his room and lets Cerberus out.

"I'm going to research how to meditate real quick. I can probably get out of the family dinner by saying I have lots of homework. Do you want me to bring you something?"

"Oooh there's food? What's there to eat?"

"Today? Chicken and pasta and bread and really fancy sauce my mom likes to buy. Chocolate chip cookies as dessert."

"Coooookies!"

"I'll bring you a cookie or two, then. Don't think I can sneak off with the whole plate."

And he heads downstairs.

He gets access to the family computer for ten minutes by claiming it needs an update. He's the one who set it up and keeps fixing it, after all, so nobody questions it.

And he's back up about twenty minutes later with a plate of chicken and pasta in fancy sauce, and four cookies. "Two for me, two for you."

"Yaaaaay!" he says, floating over to a cookie and grabbing it to eat.

It's warm, and contains an above-average amount of chocolate.

Terry chows down on the unimportant not-cookie food, eats one cookie, puts the other one on his desk, says, "Please don't eat that, I want it later." And starts meditating.

Relaxed sitting pose. Deep breaths. Clear thoughts. It's difficult to have clear thoughts after a day as... Interesting, as this. He doesn't seem to be getting anywhere.

"It helps if you put your cards around you and your staff on your lap," Cerberus adds.

So he does that. Staff exits backpack. Windy goes directly in front of him, with Float off to the left slightly.

And this time he tries to focus on the staff, and magic that he damn well knows is in him.

Well, for as long as he damn well knows things, he won't really get anywhere, even with the subconsciously soothing influence of the staff.

He tries that for a while, but eventually... Far be it for Terry to stick to something that is obviously not working. The traditional meditation exercise of trying to think about nothing, taking deep, ryhtmic breaths, takes place.

That starts getting him somewhere. It's much easier than he'd expected, too, and he soons falls into a pattern, and starts seeing things behind his closed eyelids...

He doesn't stop the deep breaths. He sort of... Double-thinks, or tries to, deliberately not interpreting the mysterious images on a conscious level. Experience it now. Think about it later.

Then he will successfully continue meditating!

The mysterious images start being much less mysterious: a little ball of sunlight, bright as can be, incredibly and terrifyingly powerful, about the same place he'd expect Cerberus to be; the two cards, floating to either side of him, slowly gaining form in their avatars.

The ball of sunlight (too bright) knocks him out of meditation when he realizes it's in the same place as Cerberus.

"Eesh, that will take some getting used to. You're much shinier while I'm meditating, Cerberus." He checks the time.

He's only been out for like twenty minutes.

"See, I told you this wasn't my true form."

Twenty minutes is longer than it felt like.

He sets an alarm for 9:30. "Gonna try again."

"Okay."

Meditation resumes.

So do the slowly appearing images.

He continues to not really try to interpret them, trying to get... Feelings. Impressions. Being so unanalytical is a challenge, but he's trying.

Ball of sunlight: check.

Avatars of the cards growing in detail: check.

That one's Float. That one's Windy. Cerberus is over there. He doesn't think about this, just knows it.

That is correct! And he gets more details, too.

The Float embodies... gravity. Lack thereof. It has layers of meaning involving control and will, but overall it's a fairly simple and simple-minded card.

The Windy, however... is wind. She is storm and gale and hurricane, she is the summer breeze over the sea, she is a goddess and an animal, she is larger and older than most things. She is looking kindly on Terry, grandmotherly, even, and smiling.

He stays there for a while, absorbing some of the layers of meaning. The wind is big and free and giving and taking.

Then he falls out of it when he tries a little to hard to understand Windy. Something that likely isn't going to really happen for months or years, if ever.

...And he's the cardcaptor, with some sort of strange power over these vast, old things.

It's glorious and terrible. Excited and anxious. He's been thrown into the middle of something big and messy and now it's sink-or-swim. He's damn well going to swim.

He sits there, thinking, for a few minutes, then goes back to meditating. He's seen what Windy and Float are, can he piece together what they want?

Float: doesn't have much in the way of desires.

Windy: seems to... want... something? Related to Terry? Once again that grandmotherly feeling around him. She wants... what's best for him? It's fuzzy and vague, and waiting more time doesn't seem to reveal any further details.

As the cards' attitudes toward him go, 'grandmotherly' is definitely one of the better possibilities.

He stops meditating to eat that second cookie and ask Cerberus, "How do I find the rest of the cards anyway?"

"They will reveal themselves. They won't have travelled very far, and you'll be able to feel them."

"So I don't necessarily need to go on a scavenger hunt, good. Can the staff be made smaller without The Small? I don't think it'll fit in my backpack like so, and carrying it around openly would be needlessly attention-getting."

"You just need to will it to return to its Key shape."

Staff: Become key.

"I'm going to sleep. Tomorrow's Saturday so I can go out to the middle of nowhere and practice with Float and Windy some more. Our family doesn't do dessert at breakfast, fair warning." Because sweets are blatantly obviously one of the best paths to Cerberus's goodwill. "Though pancakes with syrup and chocolate sauce might count."

"They dooooo!"

"I'll try to swing some then."

And he gets ready for bed, and then sleeps.

Cerberus finds a comfortable-looking soft spot and sleeps, too.

At breakfast the next morning, Terry does manage to get two pancakes with syrup and chocolate sauce and whipped cream for Cerberus. He includes a fork.

Cerberus wakes up, yawns, looks around blinking and—

-screams.

"Augh, shh, shush!" He pokes his head out the room door. "I'm okay just stubbed my toe!"

"What's wrong, Cerberus?"

"Who's Cerberus? Who are you? Why are you huge? Where am I what's going on-"

"Oh hell. I think a card got you. Um. I'm not huge, you're small. I learned about magic yesterday when I found these magic cards, some things happened, long story short most of 'em are out there loose causing havoc. One got you, I think. Time would cover amnesia, change if you and Cerberus got swapped..."

"What are you talking about?!"

"Magic exists. Surprise. You are an unsuspecting victim of same, and I'm going to fix it. Allow me to demonstrate." He finds the key-staff and wills it to be big again.

It very unhelpfully remains key-shaped!

"I know magic exists, and it'd be obvious anyway now that I suddenly woke up in—" He looks around. "Your room instead of mine."

"Someone else who knows more about this stuff than me. I should have quizzed Cerberus more. Hm." The activation phrase yesterday was something like 'Oh Key, grant him the power.' ...Half of tech support is trying the obvious thing.

"Oh, Key, show your true power. Release!"

That works.

"I presume Cerberus is," he looks down, then behind himself at his tail, then up at Terry, "this stuffed bear's name."

"Yes. Did you happen to interact with a strange card, looking something like..." He searches for the Clow Book, aiming to take out Float.

Float is exactly where he left it.

"...This? Clow cards. Very powerful, currently most of them uncontrolled due to an accident that scattered them everywhere when I tried to use one."

He peers at it. "Never seen anything like that." Pause. "Oh, duck, Cerberus is in my body, isn't he."

"Duck? Anyway, probably, yes. Which is why we have to fix it as soon as possible. I don't think he'll deal with it gracefully. I can supposedly detect the loose cards while they're active if I meditate, so I'm going to do that."

He sits cross-legged, staff in hand but cards off to the side since he's looking for something else.

...well, he looks like he knows what he's doing. Whoever-it-is that's inside Cerberus' body will watch.

His meditative trance will come to him a little bit more easily than the previous day.

Looking like you know what you're doing is a valuable skill.

He carefully doesn't think about determining in which direction might he be feeling something that's not Cerberus-y, Windy, or Float. It really is getting easier.

It's easier but still not easy, and kinda slow going. Whoever-it-is that's in Cerberus' body seems to glow somewhat less brightly than Cerberus himself. The more he waits, the farther his consciousness expands.

Calm. Calm. Reach out and out and out...

And before he reaches Cerberus, he'll find a little ball of silver light running fast somewhere.

That is probably the card. He gets as good an impression of where it is and where it's heading as he can, then snaps out of the trance. "I think I found the card. Heading toward the mall. Question is, do you want me to try and catch it immediately to get this fixed sooner, or go to your house and talk to Cerberus who's probably in your body?"

"We could, like, call."

"That... Would require permission to use the phone."

"You need permission to use the phone? How old are you?"

"Seventeen. They're strict about 'privileges' and 'decadence' and 'discipline'. Can we not talk about my parents, though?"

"...sure. Tha—okay, sure, whatever. Um. My mother's a sensible person who knows magic exists and knows me very well, is this Cerberus dangerous or something?" Pause. "When he's not a teddy bear."

"I don't know him that well but I'm pretty sure he's good-natured. Kinda bad at explaining things, but he is helping me with the cards. He's got a big sweet tooth so if you have cookies or anything like that they're liable to be gone. I'll just go show my homework to dad then if you wanna ride in my backpack and give me directions I can bike us over to your place."

"...in your backpack. That's delightful. But no, if Cerberus is okay I think it's best if we chase this card thing and fix it."

"Unless you're really good at sitting still or want to bet nobody notices an animate teddy bear and makes a scene out of it?"

"No, I'm cool, I'll go in your backpack, do I even need to breathe?" He checks. "Yep, I do, leave some space for air please."

"Got it." His two cards go in either side of his jacket pocket. He runs down and displays English homework and promises to have Math and Biology done today. He runs back up empties his backpack until it only contains the Clow Book, one notebook, some pencils and a calculator. 

"...so, uh, what's your name?"

"Right, panic over, introductions. Hi, I'm Terry Miller. Please don't call me Terence unless you absolutely have to."

"Okay. I'm Sadde Woods, you can call me that, it's weird but it's all I've got."

"Nice to meet'cha, let's go catch a card."

...oh wow he's cute, Sadde hadn't noticed this before.

"Yes, do let's."

He holds out the backpack. When Sadde hops in he closes it only halfway, plenty of space for his head to poke out. And he heads for the garage and gets on a bike and zooms off toward the mall, taking shortcuts away from big roads here and there. It's a pretty nice bike. "I'm gonna meditate again near the mall. Won't take as long if we're closer."

"Okay." Pause. "Can I grill you on this magic after I have my body back? This looks fascinating after you get over the switching-bodies thing."

"Sure, it really is. Though I'm relatively new to it too. I found the cards in a used bookstore just yesterday for crying out loud, it's like a real life Chronicles of Narnia."

"...is there an alternate dimension with an evil queen, too? 'Cause if there is I don't wanna get in there until we have a plan, I don't wanna rely on magic lion Jesus to save me."

"No, it's just Harry Potter didn't feel right and that was the first other book I thought of." He makes a turn, rolling through a field and down a hill and onto one of those park bike paths.

"Why didn't Harry Potter feel right?"

"Cerberus really really isn't Dumbledore."

He cracks up.

Terry gives a little 'snrk'. He keeps pedalling.

Sadde lets him. He's not a particular fan of silences but it may not be very nice to be talking to the guy on his bike, he'll get winded.

"I mean, maybe there is an evil queen, I don't know much more about magic than you, but we'll have to ask Cerb." It's not that far to the mall, and Terry's pedalling kinda hard and taking shortcuts, they're almost there.

"And I'd like to reiterate my misgivings about having to rely on magic lion Jesus."

"Hey, any help you can get. I'll defintely be practicing without him too, though."

"Yeah, sure, but I mean, he's a Deus Ex Machina, uh, quite literally, and in real life those things don't really happen."

"Yeah, real life isn't a story, but that doesn't make it impossible that someone who wants to help and actually can shows up. I'm not gonna rush into things and trust that, oh everything will be fine, we're the heroes after all! If that's, huff, what you're worrying about."

"Yes, that's what I'm worrying about, I'm glad to see the person who commands power to switch people's bodies has his head screwed on straight."

"I don't have that yet, got to catch Change to undo this. Ugh, really wish Windy didn't scatter the cards everywhere." Here they are at the edge of the mall parking lot. "It was running toward here-ish. Gonna try to find it again." Meditation!

It hasn't moved a long way away yet.

Also, it's actually pretty obvious which way it went, if you go about the subtle clues like the bit of bark on that tree that became glass, or how that park bench is apparently made of grass.

Yeah, maybe he won't actually need to meditate. He bikes after it, psyching himself up. When he can see it, he stops and pulls out the Key. "Here we go. Key, show me your true power, release!"

The Key releases!

And there's the Change, running this way and that. It turns around, notices Terry, jumps, and starts running away.

Pull, toss, tap, "Float! Make me a little lighter but still heavy enough to run!" Tap. "Windy! Try to slow it down, and help us chase it with wind at our backs if you can do both!"

Float does that, and Windy (for now) seems to be unable to multitask. It chooses to go after Change, who jumps and runs this way and that. Each patch of ground it touches is transmuted into something else.

Terry yanks off his bike helmet and wields it in the hand not holding the staff, intending to use it as a shield or holderif he gets close enough.

Is Sadde-as-a-bear still in his backpack? They might not be for much longer with all this running and sharply changing directions, trying to cut the Change off and lead it to a dead end.

He doesn't much care about the few early-morning mallgoers who can see him running like a madman after a little mousey thing.

Sadde is still inside Terry's bag, and a soft 'wheee' can be heard sometimes. He's probably having fun in there.

The Change isn't very smart, and is very easily led to a dead end.

"Alright Windy, good job, now keep it in that corner!"

And he approaches step by step and wields the staff at it once he judges he's close enough and shouts the dutifully memorized phrase, "Change, I command you to return to your power confined, Clow Card!"

It glows! And now is a card.

"Okay, that was fun."

Terry sits down. "Wooh. I'm gonna need to take gym more seriously. But, yes." He hefts himself back up. "I don't want to try changing you back until you and Cerberus are next to each other. Just in case. D'you mind waiting a bit more?"

"Eh, this could've been worse, I've only been inside this bear for, like, a few hours. D'you think Cerberus would be wanting to lead my mother to your place?"

"If he doesn't get too lost for it, he probably will. I could maybe use our phone if I listen to a lecture. Or, well, there's payphones here and there."

"I don't—" Pause. "I'm not gonna ask. What would your parents do if my mother suddenly showed up at your place looking for you and you weren't there?"

"I mean. They're not that bad. Dunno if they'd invite her in for brunch or take her phone number and promise to call or what, but they won't be too upset, only kind of confused and suspicious that, oh, why didn't you tell us you had a new friend and their mom was coming over how rude."

"...I see. So I guess the best idea is if we go to your place, and then... Um, calling still sounds like the best idea."

"Maybe I can dodge it with Voip. Er, voice over IP. It's a neat trick that lets you use a computer as a phone... But you need a credit card to sign up, it's not free. Yeah, I'll just ask to use the phone."

"Windy, Float, return." He looks at a few patches of Changed stuff in the wake of the chase. Is it still Changed?

Yep.

"Okay." He won't ask.

"Should probably undo this stuff." Toss, "Change! Nice to meet you. D'you mind putting everything back? I know it's probably boring, but some things are a certain way for a reason."

If it looks upset by this command it doesn't show it, and it darts this way and that, fixing what it did.

"Thanks!" Terry jogs back to his bike and waits for Change to finish.

It does!

...quite thoroughly, too, given that the last thing it does is land on Cerberus' head.

Cerberus looks around, then at Change. "Terry! Quick! That's the card! Capture it!"

"Oops! I already did, actually. Didn't mean to reverse you quite yet, I was gonna go find Sadde's mom. C'mere, Change, fix the dent on my bike?"

Fixed!

"Oh. She's at their place, I wanted to bring them to yours but I didn't know where it was and she said Sadde would probably contact her."

"Hm, don't suppose you know where their house is? Or their phone number? If not we might just have to stay here and hope they come looking."

"I don't, sorry. This place changed a lot in the last thirty years..."

"It's not a bad place to wait, really. I do think Sadde knows where we are, so I'll probably just play around with Float and Change and Windy a little bit into the park and see if they show up."

"Okay. But won't other people see?"

"Well there are enough trees to hide a little. But, point, maybe just Change and just little things."

"Okay."

So he sits down in the trees and tries to discover the limits of the Change card. One-thing-at-a-time quickly becomes obvious, so the dent in his bike is reluctantly allowed to continue existing. Color of his fingernail? Size of a twig? Texture of the grass? A single letter on a page? Can he Change something into something complicated, like a watch? Something slightly less complicated but still tricky that he can actually describe fully? The length of a single hair? The length of all his hair? And so on.

And eventually a boy arrives with his mother. "Hello," the boy says, grinning at Terry.

"If it wasn't clear, this is my son Sadde, whom you've met inside your bear."

"Hello! I hope today wasn't too alarming. Change, undo and return." He stands up. "I'm Terry. Nice to meet you, and nice to meet you again, Sadde."

"It was somewhat alarming when my child started acting..." She eyes the bear and settles on "oddly."

"Nice to meet you again, indeed."

"Cerberus is better off as a plush toy, probably. Seems to have worked out alright though."

"I'm better off in my true form!"

Sadde eyes the bear, too. "True form?"

"Yes! I'm bigger and more powerful and can control fire and earth."

"Oh? How do you get to true form? ...Please don't demonstrate if it's very dramatic, we don't want unnecessary attention."

"Now that you're cardcaptor, I'm tied to your power. You need to capture at least Firey and Earthy before I can use my true form again."

"...Firey? Is there a card seriously named Firey?"

"Firey, Earthy, Watery, Windy. The four classical elements are represented, yes. There's also cards such as Flowery and Glow, Jump, Fly, Through, Fight. Here, I've got them all listed." He flips pages in the notebook and holds it out.

Sadde gives Terry a look.

Laura knows that look. "Should I leave you two to it, then? I'm afraid I'm a muggle and will probably not have much to contribute."

Pff, Muggle. He completely misses the look. "If you say so? I'd think it could be interesting, but fair enough."

"I'm sure Sadde will give me the highlights later." She waves. "Are you gonna eat at home?"

"Maybe, but don't wait for me, love you, bye!" He finally accepts the notebook Terry offered.

(Best mom.)

Terry starts summarizing all his experiments with Windy and Change and Float thus far. He predicts that he could probably fly without the Fly by combining Windy and Float, but this seems risky and attention-getting so he hasn't tried it. He so wants Fly though.

...okay, is Terry still missing the look, because the look is still on Sadde's face.

He's either misinterpreting or ignoring it since he seems to think Sadde is eagerly listening in the name of science and learning!

Well. Yes, there's that, too, they're not very different looks.

"Hey, can I see if I can do a thing with Change?" he eventually asks.

"Er. Maybe. Cerberus, can he even use the cards? Safely?"

"Yes. Anyone with magic can use the cards, but they might not be as powerful or versatile as they are with the card's true owner."

"It won't get loose again or anything like that?"

"Not while you're paying attention to it. It might try to sneak away when you're not looking, if you don't write your name on it before that."

"Sure you can try Change, then. But what's this about names, Cerb?"

Sadde grins and takes the card. "I think Kero sounds better."

"If you write your name on the card, it will recognise you as its master. And it's Cerberus."

"Kero," he insists, smirking, then: "Change!"

Sadde starts glowing and—

—becomes a girl.

"Yes! Success!"

"Is there any reason not to-"

"Thaaaaat is. A thing. That I probably won't try myself. I guess if it can do minds it's not very far-fetched. Neat."

Sadde giggles. "Can I keep it? Can I can I caaaannnn I?"

"Um. Using our story metaphor from earlier, I'm not sure if you're Ron Weasley or Draco Malfoy yet. Maybe in a few days. Discretion and valor and all that."

Sadde glows again and is holding the card. He hands it back. "That is very reasonable and it makes me want to kiss you even more than I already do."

What.

"Uh. That's a- Really, me? The alpha nerd?"

"Buddy if the only reason you can think of for us not to be kissing right now is that you're a huge nerd I should've mentioned this a while ago, I already wanted to when I was a bear. It's okay if you don't, though, we've just met and such. Also I'm a boy half the time, I understand this can be a dealbreaker."

...Cerberus is wondering what he got himself into.

"Um. I would like more than five seconds to think about it." He does not mention how 'is sometimes a boy' is far from a dealbreaker. The secret is a reflex.

"Also entirely reasonable, also makes me want to kiss you more."

Eyebrow raise. "Is there anything that doesn't make you want to kiss me? What if I started shouting racial slurs?"

And internally, he has a little debate. Mostly the debate consists of a thorough search for 'Can I produce any valid reason not to kiss them? Should I give Change back first to keep up the pretending? Probably. Even if he's just as cute as a boy.'

"That would be a thing that would make me not want to kiss you," he admits. "Currently my image of you is adorable smart nerdy boy who got magic and immediately proceeded to run experiments on it. I also noticed you did not raise an objection related to gender. Racial prejudice might ruin that but somehow I don't expect it to exist."

"You're right, it doesn't."

Hm.

He hands Change back to Sadde.

"Being a boy sometimes is not a dealbreaker even if it complicates things while you are a boy."

He accepts the card again and raises an eyebrow. "Complicates things?"

(Eeeee he's gonna kiss a cute boy eeeee!)

"I. Don't really want everyone to know I want to kiss boys too sometimes."

"Oh." Pause. "Who-all counts as the everyone you don't want to know? I presume your parents are included in that list?"

(EEEEEEEEEEE)

"Mostly - nobody? I mean." Blush. "I've never had a reason to actually talk about it before."

"You're blushing!" says Captain Obvious. "That's too adorable." He shakes his head to return to the present conversation. "I don't actually mind only kissing you when I'm a girl, except for the fact that that leads to a much lower concentration of kiss-per-second than would otherwise be possible since you actually do like boys and girls. Also we've just met and I've just got a crush on you, any long-term decisions like coming out you might want to make should not be made on account of only me. We can just spend our time together nerding about magic while I look at you like I want to kiss you."

"Yeah, I'm probably just- Going to continue to pretend to be straight. For now at least. And the look is going to be distracting now that I know what it is."

He points a finger at a tree over there. "We could also kiss in a secluded place like behind that tree where no one who knows you is likely to see us."

"Or you could not!" Cerberus calls from within Terry's backpack where he's been cleverly hiding.

"Um." The blush that was retreating returns. "Er. Maybe. Cerberus, why not?"

"I didn't sign up to babysit hormonal teenagers!"

Sadde continues giving Terry the look. It is not too unlike the look one would give a particularly delectable meal. "You can stay in the bag, you don't need to watch," he says, not taking his eyes off Terry's face.

Terry's glancing between Sadde and his backpack. Still blushing. "Don't need babysitting. I'll tell Float to send you somewhere else if you want?"

"I'll stay here. If a card appears, you'll need my help!"

"Sure we will," he says, bouncing up and extending a hand to Terry. "Now how about we go over there and make out?"

"...Yes."

Sadde's face, which could've previously been described as 'hungry,' now switches to 'boyish glee' as he takes Terry to an appropriately secluded spot and looks at him expectantly.

'Slightly nervous anticipation' is the correct description for Terry's expression right now.

He leans forward a bit-

—and his face is now full of Sadde. Who is really enthusiastic about it.

"Mmm!"

Terry is not much less enthusiastic, but significantly more hesitant.

That disappears as he gets used to it though.

Good! Terribly good!

Also, it may become immediately clear that he has done this before. Several times. With many different people. He clearly knows what he's doing.

Terry is far from bothered by this, though he is... Not nearly so experienced. He's trying! Not all that well, since Sadde's so good at being distracting, but he is trying.

Who cares Sadde can be good enough for both of them and can continue to be distracting and hug and kiss this adorable nerdy boy.