“Hold it! Hold everything!”
Tobias paused his game. He looked up at the strangely
dressed man who had just burst into his living room and the redheaded woman in
everyday street clothes who had followed him in. Tobias held back his irritation.
He was used to unexpected visitors, but these two seemed particularly strange.
“Do you mind?” he asked. “I was just about the beat the Fire
Temple.” He waved his controller at the screen in front of him.
“Ooh, is that Ocarina of Time?” the woman said, stepping
past her partner and sitting herself down on the edge of his couch.
“Kaycee,” the man said. “We do not fraternize with the suspects.”
Kaycee rolled her eyes and sat back against the cushions,
flipping through the games Tobias had stacked on the side table. “Mario 64,
Goldeneye . . . ooh, Banjo-Kazooie! You wouldn’t be willing to let me have this
one, would you?”
Tobias stared back and forth between the two visitors. “No .
. . what . . . who are you people? What are you doing in my house?”
“Ptolemais Argon,” the main said, pulling a used napkin out
of his pocket and flashing it at Tobias. “Magical Detective.”
“That’s a napkin,” Tobias said.
“And this is my partner, Kaycee Martin.”
“’Sup,” the woman said, flashing him the peace sign from
behind the guide for Conker’s Bad Fur Day she was now flipping through.
“Okay,” Tobias said. “What are you doing in my house?”
“You’ve been accused of time-traveling all throughout the Medieval
Era and impersonating a wizard. What do you have to say for yourself?”
Tobias groaned and tossed his controller aside. He got up on
his couch and yanked the manual out of Kaycee’s hands. “Look, I’m not going
around claiming to be a wizard, okay? My house just appears in the middle a field
or a mountain, and suddenly everyone just assumed it’s a magical wizard’s lair
and invited themselves in.”
“And what about reports of a magical wand you used to summon
visions of faraway wonders on a crystal ball.”
Tobias dug into his seat cushions and pulled out a remote
control. “You mean this?”
“What about the dark magic you used to communicate with
spirits from the beyond.”
“I made a phone call.”
“And the horseless chariot you used to carry a villager
hundreds of miles away to the Misty Mountains of the North.”
“Car,” Kaycee said before Tobias could say anything. She had
been messing around with one of the transformers Tobias had carefully posed on
his table. Tobias hadn’t even thought she was paying attention.
Tobias and Ptolemais stared at her, Tobias torn between
answering the detectives’ questions and wanting to rip the figure from her
hands. “Some guy needed a ride. I took him out in my Chevy. Is that so wrong?”
“What about this King Arthur who received the sword Excalibur
from you?”
“Some farm boy liked my Marth cosplay. How was I supposed to
know he’d use it to proclaim himself king?”
“And the princess you held hostage?”
“We met at a local tavern. She wanted to see my action
figure collection. I didn’t even know she was a princess until that guy broke
in here and started waving that halberd in my face.”
“Oh, oh, oh, let me guess,” Kaycee said, holding up the transformer
she had successfully changed back into its beast form. “Everybody thinks these
are sealed monsters that you have vanquished with your powerful magic.”
“See? She gets it?” Tobias said. He reached for the toy. “Can
I have that back, please?”
Kaycee snorted. “No way,” she said. “I’ve been looking for a
good condition Inferno forever.”
“Kaycee,” Ptolemais said. “We do not play with the evidence.”
“Oh, please, Tolly,” Kaycee said, getting to her feet,
Inferno still gripped firmly in her hand. Tobias reached out to say something
but thought better of it. “I think it’s pretty obvious there’s no case here. It’s
just the locals being idiots.”
Ptolemais looked a little uncomfortable. “But . . . but you
can’t deny he hasn’t been reckless with his usage of modern technology in front
of the people of this era.”
“Oh, please. You read his file. The guy’s banned from his
own time period over some cyberhacking scheme. What’s he supposed to do, just
live as a hermit for the rest of his life?”
“I’ve been trying,” Tobias said.
“Hush, dude,” Kaycee said. “You’re not part of this.”
But it’s literally all about me, he thought.
“Now,” Kaycee said, returning to her partner, “Drop the
bravado and let’s leave the poor guy alone with his video games.”
“But,” Ptolemais said, looking back and forth between her
and Tobias, “but I had a whole epic one-liner planned out for when we arrested
him.”
“I know, I know. You can use it on the next guy. Let’s go.”
“But it was specifically tailored to this guy’s situation.”
“I’m sure it was. Now, carpet. Go.”
Ptolemais’s shoulders slumped. He glared at Tobias. “We’ll
be watching you,” he said, before turning on his heel and marching out the
door.
Kaycee slipped her phone out of her back pocket and searched
through it for a second. She then pulled out a wallet and tossed Tobias a full
seventy dollars out of it. “For the royalty,” she said, holding up and pointing
at Inferno. “Thanks, bye.” She skipped and headed out the door.
Tobias got up and went to the window to see the pair of them
taking off on a magic carpet and disappearing into the distance. Tobias sighed,
locked his door, and went back to his game. “I really need to invest in some better
locks,” he muttered to himself.
