Turning Back To Normal

'Master?' Nevaeh whispered as she stood in the dark inside Raphael's bedroom, exactly where the Grace had teleported her and watched Raphael, sleeping soundly. She'd worn long gloves to hide her partially burnt wrist. 'Master!' Nevaeh said a little loudly. He snored. Nevaeh sighed. 'MASTER! WAKE UP!' she yelled loudly. Raphael woke up making a startling sound.

He quickly stood up within the blink of an eye and had his left hand out-stretched, as he tried to focus his eyes on a twinkling body.

'Nevaeh? Jesus! What happened to you?' asked an alarmed Raphael, approaching a green Nevaeh. 'And how many times have I told you not to do that? Its 2:00 am in the morning!' he said, quickly pulling out a pair of glasses out of his night stand and putting them on. The lights of his bedroom turned themselves on.

'Where is your wand?' Nevaeh asked.

Raphael frowned. 'I don't know. Why are you green?'

'You don't know? You don't keep it handy when you sleep? Who are you, John Constantine?' Nevaeh taunted. She waved her wand. A brown, slightly battered wooden stick came soaring through the air. Raphael caught it.

'I had a rough day,' he said smugly. 'I am guessing, you as well? Tell me why you are green before I call your father,' Raphael warned firmly, now pulling out a stethoscope from the top drawer of his night-stand.

'It's kind of embarrassing,' Nevaeh said quietly, sitting on a chair and looking glum. She knew she was bad at lying, which is exactly why she'd come prepared. Raphael raised his eyebrows.

'Joe and I were talking and we were feeling out of touch with our youth—'

'Both of you are twenty!' snapped Raphael.

'Yes, exactly! No longer teenagers. We felt like doing something different and—'

'How different?' Raphael sounded anxious.

'We went down town and into a surprisingly shady club, where this hippie looking dude came near us at the bar and offered us death-sticks' Nevaeh said.

'Excuse me? What are death-sticks?' Raphael asked, looking clearly alarmed.

'That was the exact question on my mind! But I tried to tell the fellow that he does not want to sell me death-sticks. He clearly needs to go home and rethink his life, but he was being persistent, so we bought one, purely out of curiosity' Nevaeh said, watching her tired master run a hand over his head. 'And I lit a cigarette over the green flame of the death-stick. Usually people just inhale the smoke that comes out of it, or so I have been told, but I didn't do that. It was a normal cigarette, but the smoke was all green and eventually, I was green,' finished Nevaeh.

'Wait, how many cigarettes did you light by that flame?

'Three or four'

'WHY?'

'I didn't have my lighter on me and—'

Nevaeh received a sharp, exasperated look by her Master. 'I didn't have my wand,' she hastily added.

'That never happens,' stated Raphael, heavily frowning, 'you don't go anywhere without your wand.'

'I was wearing a dress and –'

'And we all know what you do then—'

'I didn't have time to put a transparent scotch tape on it with a stupid charm and make it conceal itself! Our methods are – puny and feeble!' snapped Nevaeh, standing up fumingly.

'What has happened?' Raphael asked, clearly taken aback.

'I – I just need to get back to normal' said Nevaeh.

Raphael nodded, wondering what was Nevaeh's out-burst all about and stood up, walking towards the door and opening it. Nevaeh walked out of his room and marched straight down the stairs. She walked inside an adjacent room with Raphael walking behind her with the stethoscope wrapped around his neck and his wand in his other hand.

Nevaeh took a seat on the chair in front of a huge wooden table, piled with notes and drawings. She shifted her chair a little, stretching out her arm and pulling one of the papers to take a look at it. She was straightening the paper by her finger-tip, which had a battered sketch of what looked like a demon on fire, when all the sheets soared away from her, including the one she was glancing at, and they stacked themselves up into a neat stack, landing softly on the shelf of the opposite wall.

'Someone has been doing research,' Nevaeh said coyly as Raphael, who was suddenly wearing his travelling coat lowered his wand and took a seat in front of her, drawing out the stethoscope.

'You know the drill, inhale and exhale,' Raphael said, putting on the stethoscope. Nevaeh nodded. 'Doing that since I was born.'

'So where was Loki when all of this happened?' Raphael asked, analysing her heart beat.

Nevaeh blinked a little. 'He wanted to stay in with a book. He is not that out-going' she said. Her eyes widened as she felt her left wrist healing a little. Nevaeh slowly clapped her hand tightly on her thigh, hoping that the golden-glow will not be visible from under the thick, black gloves.

Nevaeh sighed a little, internally wondering whether lying about Loki was making her hand heal as well.

She was pulled out of her thoughts when Raphael pulled out his stethoscope and looked worriedly at Nevaeh who raised her eyebrows.

'You have inhaled a lot of that smoke' he said slowly.

'Do you know how to get it out of me? I know its effects are supposed to wear off with time, but I am not enjoying its feel anymore. It is some kind of truth-speaking flame' said Nevaeh, stifling a yawn.

'It is not a mere flame, kiddo. You are brimming with the Fire of Candour' Raphael said, watching her face for any hints of recognition, but she merely blinked at him with eyes reflecting an utter lack of information.

'Okay,' Nevaeh shrugged.

'Okay? You don't have any questions regarding it?' Raphael asked, now wondering where the curious little girl whom he had first met has gone.

'Candour, meaning it compels one to speak the truth, we already know that,' said Nevaeh. She was really tired and just wanted to get back to normal.

'What I don't understand is the fact that you were able to conjure that fire by using a – a death-stick, if there is even such a thing' said Raphael. Nevaeh's stomach curled in fear as she wondered if her Master was onto her regarding her lie. 'I should search for the bloke who tried to sell you that stick, so that I may have a word with him about where he came across such a peculiar thing,' finished Raphael.

'Peculiar? How so?' Nevaeh asked.

Raphael laughed. 'Because this is an out-worldly fire, so the odds of this existing in down town NY, inside some stick, are none. Very few, extremely powerful beings are capable of conjuring such a fire' said Raphael.

'How powerful?' hushed Nevaeh. Loki had lit the fire as easily as a Bunsen burner.

'Beyond your imagination, kiddo. Super-human. Herculean, I dare say—'

'That means godlike!' snapped Nevaeh, as though he were going off topic.

'Precisely,' agreed Raphael.

Raphael had found a way to turn Nevaeh's skin back to its original self and she sat happily on his table, analysing an oval shaped, glass machine which had little semi-gaseous bubbles popping inside. It had several tubes connecting to it and was balanced on top of a sturdy looking metal holder.

'So, eventually, it needs to be imbibed out of me?' Nevaeh said slowly, watching Raphael loosen a few tubes, leaving only two. He pulled out a horribly huge-looking needle and attached it at the end of a tube.

'Imbibe, huh?' Raphael chuckled. 'Yes, this phial will take care of that. It will suck out the residue of the fire and I am hoping you would immediately turn back to your original self. He held out his hand.

Nevaeh's eyes widened. 'Yes, master?' she asked with uncertainty, although she was beginning to understand how he wanted to make this work.

'I need to penetrate this needle into your hand, or to be more precise, your vein. Stretch out your left hand and remove the glove' Raphael said, now fumbling with a few bottles filled with colourful liquids.

'Left – hand?' Nevaeh asked anxiously. He nodded distractedly.

'Why?'

'I thought you needed this to be quick,' Raphael said.

'Yes. Why don't you just penetrate it in my neck or something?'

Raphael turned around to frown heavily at her, who was blinking a bit too innocently. 'And why would we do that if I can just as easily finish the work with a negligibly painful measure?'

'My – my hands are not feeling well, master' Nevaeh said quietly, looking at the floor and cursing her lack of lying properly.

'Oh? Are they under the weather? Or feeling blue?' asked a snide Raphael, now waving his wand in front of the oval glass container.

Nevaeh was suddenly lost in deep thought. The memory of her saying the exact same thing to Loki flashed in front of her eyes and she remembered the way his eyebrows had unpleasantly twitched. Nevaeh ran a hand over her face as realization hit her regarding their parting on Asgard, when she had known nothing yet she had triggered something deep inside of him.

'Shit,' mumbled Nevaeh slowly.

Raphael clicked his fingers sharply to bring her back on Earth.

'Master, just jab the damn thing in my neck and get this over with. Please, I beg of you,' Nevaeh said desperately.

Raphael let out a huge sigh. He rubbed a transparent liquid on her neck and inserted the needle right into her vein. Nevaeh closed her eyes flinchingly and her fists clenched under the sucking pressure she felt on her neck.

Raphael sat opposite to her on a chair and analysed the green smoke filling the glass phial. 'You doing okay there, kiddo?'

Nevaeh nodded.

'You can speak, just don't move your head' said Raphael.

'Master?'

'Yes?'

'Can – can anyone enter our impenetrable shield?' Nevaeh asked cautiously.

Raphael looked at her in surprise. 'What does the name suggest you?' he asked.

'Yes, but the way you sometimes say things makes me wonder if there are creatures who are powerful beyond our slightest imagination, and if one happens to come across—'

'If one happens to come across such a being, then one must head home immediately and call their master or their parents,' said Raphael in a sharp voice.

'HYPOTHETICALLY!' snapped Nevaeh, flinching as she tilted her head in annoyance. Raphael sighed heavily. He was never fond of her hypothetical questions.

'Our defence field is purely mystical and focuses on protecting against the dark forces. It depends on whether the creature is filled with enough magical potential to manipulate the field, or strong enough to crack it open,' Raphael said.

Nevaeh smiled a little, sighing again as she thought about her Master's words. Loki certainly wasn't dark and his intentions at that time were purely of healing her hand, which made him capable of entering her defensive force field.

'So what happens when we need protection against someone who isn't dark or dangerous?' Nevaeh asked slowly, as though blaming their magic to be unreliable.

'Why would anyone need protection then?' asked a perplexed Raphael.

'Sometimes, one can be good and can have good intentions, yet one can feel the need to stay protected against that said one, even though the one against whom one needs protection is not being particularly dark. What does one do then?' Nevaeh asked, making Raphael even more confused.

'Nevaeh, you frighten me when you ask such oddly specific questions,' Raphael said, sighing heavily while running a hand through his hair as though facing a major crisis.

'Do not be alarmed, Master. Do not forget that I stated this to be a hypothetical scenario,' Nevaeh said slowly and her eyes flickered as she glanced at the phial through her peripheral vision. She moved her head to watch the green smoke slowly float inside. Nevaeh glanced at her arms which were now a fading green, blinking between her normal skin and a hint of emerald.

She continued. 'It's like someone has concluded in ancient times that there is either good or bad. There is no in between. No middle. People can be good, yet dark at times. Our magic is –'Nevaeh paused as she saw Raphael raising an eyebrow heavily. 'Restricted,' she said. He dropped his eyebrow back to normal and nodded.

'That is the way magic is supposed to be. Too much of anything can be devastating. Magic within boundaries and limits can be beautiful, but excessive magic can lead to chaos,' Raphael said, as though telling her a life lesson and she sighed wondering if it was a subtle reference to her teenage.

'But, what if we are not the most powerful beings out there and one day we might need protection from—'Nevaeh was interrupted when Raphael stood up.

'Have you had such an encounter recently?' he asked sharply.

'No – no'

'Then, what has made you question our ancient, sacred defences that has been protecting various aspects of our lives through years?' Raphael asked with a worried look on his face.

'Questioning! Not insulting!' Nevaeh snapped. 'You say that as if it is forbidden!'

'Hence, I am asking you, rather than scolding you. I am merely asking, what was the causal factor behind this particular thought?' Raphael asked calmly.

'Master, I am just at a point in my life where I am wondering how strong I am, or can become,' Nevaeh said quietly. Raphael's stomach curled as soon as the words came out of her mouth and he resisted letting the fear show on his face.

Raphael breathed a sigh of relief when he saw the emerald hint disappear from her body, her eyes returning back to its original dark colour and her skin turn back to normal. 'Don't you think that is something you should discuss with your father, as well?' he asked, pulling out the needle from her neck and rubbing it with cotton as she winced slightly.

'I will, soon. But I want you to keep this death-sticks business between us. Please, Master,' Nevaeh said with sad, twinkling eyes.

'Give me one reason why I shouldn't tell on you,' he said.

'Because I don't want them to think that I am rebelling again or something, when in reality, it was just a weak moment mixed with lack of judgement on my part,' Nevaeh said quietly.

'Yeah, I don't want to scare them either,' Raphael said as Nevaeh got up and glanced at her hands. 'You look just like before.'

'Great! I will get going, then,' Nevaeh said.

'Thank you, Master. It was so kind of you to wake up from your sleep—'a mocking Raphael was interrupted by Nevaeh.

'I am sorry. I was pre-occupied. Thank you for fixing me! And yes, you should go back to sleep. I am sorry to wake you up so abruptly—'

'I am kidding! Now, let's get you home' Raphael said.

Nevaeh shook her head in disapproval. 'Y'all say that you take me seriously and yet you offer to escort me home, like I am a kid who can't take care of herself!' snapped Nevaeh.

'It's 3:00 am in the morning! Your parents are not here! It is my duty to—'

'It is New York! And I am a witch! Don't you think if I can survive on Asgard, then I can go home safely, on my own planet? I am not a kid anymore!' Nevaeh said angrily.

'You will always be a kid for us, Nev,' Raphael said, but sighed when he saw the adamant look on her face. 'Fine, move along. Get out, now.'

Nevaeh sighed a breath of relief, and soon bid farewell to her Master after once again thanking him for his help. She was mostly glad that she was back to her old self. Now all she had to do was wait for Loki to return, if he ever did..