Abra Cadaver

Forty Years Ago

Many years ago, Lake Sarai did not look very different. The same big cottage that housed the gift shop near Lake Sarai in the current time was instead owned by Michael Slater, his personal cottage in the past.

He loved nature, anything to do with it, telling anyone who would listen that it is pure. This made his wife Sara, give a weird smile, his strange obsession with things being clean, and found it ironic that a man who was obsessed with purity loved the outdoors, one of the dirtiest places.

Michael had become a braggart.

He had mastered his skill long ago, and in four sentences he built the outside of the cottage, impressing his two youngest children, Rico and Maximillian. They stood on top of the hill near the lake, watching reality bend to his will, all for a vacation home he would use twice.

Rico was eleven, Maximillian nine, and they came prepared as two young boys did for the outdoors. With as many electronics as possible.

Which their father hated.

The older they became, the less interested they were in the outdoors, but they could all agree on coming to the lake every summer because this time there was wi-fi.

While Michael walked around the small cottage speaking a few words, creating furniture using his magic phrases, Sarah helped her sons unpack and noticed something inside her youngest's suitcase.

A book on magic tricks.

She grinned, moved a long lock of her white hair behind her ear, and started to read some of the tricks and illusions. Little notes were put in the margins, such as show Rico later, and convince Eve she ate a rock.

Most of the notes that were highlighted said ask dad later, and she thought it was so sweet that he was trying to impress him.

Maximillian opened the door and saw her reading his book, and he turned redder than an apple. He didn't argue or ask her to stop, he was a shy and quiet boy, anxious. Sara worried if she would live long enough to be there to help him outgrow his awkward years because she was in her sixties, and she also worried that his entire life would be one long awkward phase.

She sat on the green bed with a wooden bed frame and told him that she was impressed that he had found a hobby all on his own without her encouragement, and he whispered a soft thank you.

"Can you show us some of your magic tricks later on?"

He nodded no.

"Are you sure Maxie? I think dad would love it."

He paused, adjusted his glasses, and then slowly nodded yes.

Sara was his biggest fan, encouraging him, suggesting he could even come up with his own magic phrase, and the more they spoke, the more he opened up, and she was so pleased.

He was so talkative now that he had someone to share his hobby with, excitedly speaking rapidly, and she couldn't remember the last time he was so interested in anything.

They came up with a secret surprise together, and he grabbed the book, ran off, his little feet thumping on the wooden floor to practice, and Sara told herself the same thing she always did when she was about to have another of her little panics.

That everything is fine.

She can't be there for him all the time, but everything is fine, nothing is wrong.

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The next week, Maximillian put on a show for his entire family back at their home.

His father was the guest of honor and this already inflated his god-sized ego. Sara had coached him on what to say, and what to do because "Maxie was so fragile already."

Her husband, however, was somewhere else mentally entirely , and she could barely keep up with him.

Even though they were the same age, he looked to be almost twenty years younger than her. Some days she felt like she was his mother nagging her son instead of his wife, but her friends told her that was normal for married couples sometimes.

Her mortality became increasingly obvious as the years went on. She was normal, her children were all astrals, and she was so tiny amongst them, a dwarf among a sea of giants. They would be so careful when around her as if she were made of glass and would break from being looked at.

This morning she made an effort to get up at the ass crack of dawn with the rest of them, and she had such a crushing headache, it was all she could muster to get out of bed.

Sara was a visitor into the strange world of the half-alien people, and even though they were her children, some days it was still work when it should not be, to keep up with their madness.

When she put on a long black skirt, braided her white hair, and donned a loose red shirt, she told herself her daily mantras, calming herself for another day of madness.

Everything is fine, nothing is wrong.

Nothing was, and she grounded herself in the present, took her anxiety medication, and exited her bedroom door, her heart racing for no reason or another, off to watch the Sunrise Show.

Little painted white chairs, re-used from her third youngest son's Perseus's wedding, were used as seating for the small audience's show.

The audience in question were the older siblings and cousins who were guilt-tripped into coming to see the magic show because they were too busy to come to the camping trip.

"He looks up to all of you, you know," Sara told them.

They all still lived at the estate at that time, so there was no excuse to go to the Sunrise Show when they were they all had the strange habit of not sleeping long nor often. So one by one, they brought their lemonades, and fizzy drinks, and complained about nothing on a cool summer morning.

Maximilian was dressed as The Magnificent Max .

His magician's outfit was a tophat he borrowed from his older brother Perseus, another leftover from his recent wedding, a cape his mother had sewed for him, and his good church clothes, but not the best ones so "dad wouldn't get angry".

Maximillian did so much research into magic he learned that abracadabra came from the Aramaic words Avada kedavra, which meant, " to destroy", and decided to be more literal for his magic words when it came time to do his finishing move.

He wanted his own flair, so he called his own word abra cadaver.

His mother didn't like it.

Maximilian and his family were in the rose bush portion of their expansive garden, and several sheets were strung up between two trees used as his curtain, which he was preparing his show behind. Rico was his assistant, wearing his own cape, but it was crudely made, a red long blanket because he wanted to do it on his own.

They burst through the bed sheets, shouting out their stage names, scaring the birds, bees, and audience members in the garden, and then making everyone laugh.

"I am the Magnificent Max!"

"I am the Radiant Rico!"

Everyone politely clapped and giggled, as they waved their arms in the air, wiggled their fingers, made strange, obscene noises, and immediately their magical illusions fell apart.

The coins in Maximillian's sleeves fell out because he moved his arms too rapidly, a gust of wind moved the sheets aside, and a cart with two rabbits could be seen. Rico sneezed, dropping cards out of his own sleeves as well.

Everyone laughed, and Rico laughed along with them, but Maximillian couldn't, he was so serious about his magic.

The self-confidence his mother had tried to build in him over the past week vanished in an instant and he ran. He ran into the secluded wooded area near the garden, and everyone continued to laugh, even Rico because he was always like this.

He's always been so silly.

Michael ran after him, into the woods, worried more about his physical safety than his feelings, and easily found him, at the same spot he always was at when he wanted to run away, but he never did.

Maximillian sat inside a giant carved-out portion of a tree, leftover toys and bits left inside from previous times he had "run away". He cried easily, silently, and his father was exasperated, and then tried to remember what his wife said that morning.

He was trying to be like him.

But it was impossible.

He could never be like his father.

No one could be someone else.

"Max, come out."

He said nothing.

"I don't like it when you ignore me. Come out."

Maximillian came out from underneath the tree, pushed the branches aside, but didn't look up. His father hugged him and softened because he knew that Maximillian was trying his hardest.

"Don't listen to them. They can't even do any magic tricks," Michael said. "You were brave enough to try."

Maximillian hugged him back and mumbled something about it not being enough.

"Max, you can't pretend to have powers. We've been over this before. You're a mule. "

"Mom said not to use that word," he screamed.

"Sorry."

His father squatted down at his eye level, and sighed again, feeling more guilt, because it was true, he shouldn't use those words.

"It's okay that you won't have an ability. Not all astrals have one, it's okay. "

Maximillian shook his head no.

"Why do you think this?"

His father purposefully asked a question that would force him to open his mouth, and Maximillian had no choice but to answer, just the two of them, underneath the branches and leaves and the thickening summer breeze.

He was young and didn't know the right words to express how he felt.

"I'm not as good as everyone else," he mumbled.

"Yes, you are. You were made as God intended."

This wasn't what he wanted to hear, and Maximillian broke down again, wailing, and his father was now cross, unable to understand how different the world would be if he couldn't give himself whatever he wanted at a moment's notice.

The only person in the family who understood Maximillian's feelings was his mother, and if his mother spoke to him, the world would be a much different place, but she did not. Instead, his father tried to solve a problem the way any parent could.

Just like Diana, Michael's first inclination was to use his ability to make his son happy. It was what any good parent would do for their child. He became soft like cottage cheese around them.

The man who had set a woman's head on fire forty years prior almost cried himself when his son told him that he had no friends.

"Rico accidentally told the kids at school, and now no one wants to be my friend."

His teachers treated him harsher, even some of his older siblings ignored him entirely, and Maximillian admitted that Rico was the only one to treat him with respect.

"Being different is hard," Maximillian cried.

"Being different is hard," his father agreed.

He saw his son cry, and all he could see was himself, all alone, at the orphanage, none of the children wanting to play with him because he was a cursed, dirty street child. His best days were when Father Alvarez and Santos came to visit, more love from monsters than people.

"Don't tell mom okay," Michael mumbled. "I can fix this."

"You can't give me powers," Maximillian replied.

" I can do anything because I love you," Michael said. " During the war, I would think of your older brothers and sisters, and I would tell myself I can do anything because they need me."

"Really?"

" Yes. So I can do anything because I love you."

He spoke it and it became true.

Michael stood up and told his son everything he thought would help boost Maximillian's self-confidence.

" You're going to be the best magician ever. No one can ever take that power from you."

Maximilian blushed and was still unsure of himself.

"Do you think it's dumb that I do magic? This kid at school said it's for babies…"

"There's nothing wrong with magic. It's silly. Wouldn't the universe be so much more fun if it was just a little bit sillier," Michael replied.

And so, everything was a little bit sillier.

"Yes! I love jokes!"

"So make as many jokes as you want. Let everything be silly. Remember what mom says when she's upset? Nothing is wrong, and everything is fine."

And so, everything was now one long joke, everything was fine, nothing was wrong.

The entire seventh realm would be just a bit off, and no one would really be sure why. No one would ever notice, and things would become a little stranger, day by day, very few people left with common sense as time went on.

Michael Slater would pass and never know the full extent of the damage he had done, subjecting the universe to silly things like sentient rocks, and superheroes so stupid and inadequate they continued to save the day out of sheer luck instead of skill.

Maximillian nodded rapidly, and his anxiety was lessened, receiving more bear hugs and scolding from his father. Michael didn't want to seem too nice, because in his mind "that's how Maximillian ended up this way".

So every time he would hug him he would sometimes say, "don't do this or that", and Maximillian would nod, obey, soaking in every word like a sponge.

"Don't be wilful when we return. Mom will be upset if you tell her what I did when we return."

"Yes sir," Maximillian said.

They returned, past the old trees and bumbling bees drunk on honey, and everyone was still there, sitting in their chairs, awkwardly waiting for his return.

Sara, the dwarf among giants, the tiny sixty-year-old woman was yelling at all of them for making a nine-year-old boy cry. One of her daughters, Tiffany, told them all to apologize so "mom wouldn't get a heart attack", and this made her scream even louder.

It was an odd sight, seeing tall men and women, some that had gone off to war, with large scars, most muscular and built, cowering under the shouts of their mother who had never raised a hand against them in their life, asking for her not to be so angry with them.

They were so sorry.

"Please, mom."

"Please."

"You're embarrassing me again, stop already."

When Maximillian returned they sheepishly pretended as if nothing happened, and they politely clapped, happy that the brief intermission was over. Instilled with new confidence, Maximilian wanted to show that he was tough.

He was a gorilla, the other gorillas were challenging him, and he couldn't fight the biggest one, his father, so he went for the second biggest gorilla, his eldest brother Michael William Slater II.

He tried not to laugh as Maximillian strutted over, across the lawn, flourishing his cape, his eyes still puffy and red, declaring he was the best magician that ever lived.

"Mickey, I saw you laughing the hardest," Maximillian shouted.

"Yes, and I am so sorry for that," he said through more laughs.

His wife, Vivian, shot him a dirty look, and now he was being admonished by another mother, who was holding Michael III, and she said " I don't want you talking to our son like this, they need to have self-confidence instilled into them".

Mickey apologized.

"Then you'll be part of my next magic trick," Maximillian declared.

Mickey tried not to laugh, but instead, he gave off a strange smile, and this set off his little brother even further. He pouted and started the first step of his magic trick. It was the easiest trick he learned, to make a quarter appear.

"Watch this," Maximillian huffed.

He motioned for Mickey to come close, leaned over, and pulled a quarter out from behind his ear. Mickey nodded in approval, more polite claps came, little oohs and aahs, and they made a huge show of it because they knew the poor thing couldn't have an ability.

He was trying his hardest.

"Next, watch me pull a scarf out of my sleeve," Maximillian declared.

Mickey sat back, crossed his arms, and Vivian told him to behave.

Maximillian pulled out a chain of scarves, in various colors from his sleeve, and everyone was now very impressed and started to think the beginning was nothing but a minor hiccup.

Looks of confusion spread across the small audience as the scarves kept going. They trailed around his body, and Rico picked it up, pulling it away from him. They pulled and pulled, and it kept going.

There was an alarming silence as Rico was now out of view, still pulling scarves, and Maximillian was giggling like a madman, declaring he was the best magician the world had ever known.

"I think your ability just blossomed," Mickey said in surprise.

Maximilian nodded rapidly, keeping his secret, not telling anyone what his father had done. Everyone looked at each other, looked at him, and then they stood up and gave him a standing ovation.

Maximillian was overwhelmed, and he started to cry again, confused, not sure how to react, and everyone laughed, because nothing had changed, he was still the same sweet boy he had always been.

"Don't laugh," he screamed.

They laughed even harder.

Rico returned, the trail of scarves marching behind him, and everyone stopped laughing. The scarves were literally marching, and their hearts sank into their stomachs, the only noise being Rico's screams as he fled from them.

Maximillian shuddered, fog escaping his mouth, curling around his body, and Michael swore under his breath, as his son's eyes changed into a kaleidoscope of colors, the world around them slowly tilting, the chairs rocking, the sky dripping like melted ice cream.

"I should have listened to my wife," Michael whispered to himself.

For months Michael wanted to use his ability to give Maximillian one, and his wife forbade him. So he told his son as many fathers did, " she's not home, I'll let you do this only once, don't tell mom, okay?"

He didn't listen to his wife and it all backfired, spectacularly, when his eldest son grabbed his youngest and tried to get him to stop, shaking him and screaming, threatening to kill him and tear his face off.

"You're going to hurt little Mike," Mickey screamed. "He's a baby! Stop it!"

"You can't tell me what to do, you're not dad!"

Mickey wasn't his dad, but he was Mike's dad, and he wasn't going to let his little brother's infantile complex endanger an infant. He backhanded Maximillian and fell to the ground, everything falling down with him.

The scarves dropped to the ground, the chairs sat still, and the sky shrunk back, to its regular cotton-shaped clouds. Maximillian's face was bruised, blood poured out of his mouth, and he was too shocked to cry.

"You hit me," Maximillian whimpered.

" Yes. And if our parents did it more you wouldn't have turned out—"

"—Michael, stop this," Vivian shouted. "You already made your point."

"—so soft! Always crying!"

The baby, Maximillian, and Rico were crying, a few others stood up to leave, and most clutched the sides of their chairs, apprehensive of what would happen next.

"He hit me! Do something," Maximillian wailed.

No one disagreed, and his parents softly discussed that maybe they had been too easy on him but didn't think Mickey was going about it right.

Maximillian stood up, he looked Mickey in the eyes, and he said the worst word he knew.

" You're a craphead."

Mickey stooped down to the level of a nine-year-old and said something that no adult would care about, but he knew would hurt his feelings.

"You can't do magic! All your tricks suck! You only made the coin appear because your ability finally blossomed."

"Take it back," Maximillian whined.

" Make me," Mickey spat.

He turned to leave, with the others, and Maximillian knew he couldn't make him do anything. Grown-ups could do whatever they wanted.

So he had to show him he could do whatever he wanted.

"I can do the best trick you've ever seen," Maximillian screamed.

Mickey continued to ignore him, and weaved through the chairs, caught up with his wife, and checked on the baby, who had finally quieted down. Maximillian ran over, and his brother was ready to physically fight a small child.

Their mother ran up behind, shouting at both of them.

"If you hit him again you're not welcome back in my home," she screamed.

"I can do the best trick ever! I can make you disappear," Maximillian taunted.

"Prove it," Mickey snapped.

Sirens went off in Vivian's head once the challenge was made, and the Magnificent Maximillian was up to the task. He lifted up his fingers, wiggled them in the air and he said

"Dissa—"

His mother dragged him by his cape, and she told him he was grounded.

Mickey laughed, and then Vivian told him he was sleeping on the couch.

"Can I at least say my magic word," Maximillian whined.

"No! We don't know what your ability does! What if it's like dad's?"

"It's okay! My word is made up!"

Maximillian glanced at his brother and said his magic words.

Abra Cadaver.

Mickey said nothing, still glaring at him, and Sara let out a sigh of relief a second too early, as his body collapsed to the ground. He died, still angry, glaring at his brother, his face frozen, eyes wide, jaws clamped shut in a disapproving gaze.

Maximillian looked at the face, the same disapproving face he would wear the rest of his life, and he told himself to do what mom did when she was upset.

"Everything is fine, nothing is wrong," Maximillian shouted. "It's gonna be okay!"

Michael witnessed it all, halfway across the lawn, and he prayed that he was mistaken, but by the time everyone had arrived to see Mickey's corpse they knew the truth.

Maximillian had killed him, and if they didn't bend to his will, they would be next.

The Magnificent Maximillian wasn't worried. He was the best magician in the world after all! He could fix this! It was a minor mistake! All burgeoning magicians make mistakes the first time around.

"I can fix this," Maximillian told his crying siblings. "I'm the best! I can do anything because I have powers, and I love you!"

"I think you've done enough," his father said.

Maximillian didn't listen, and his father was confused.

How was it possible he was being so willful? He told him not to be. His parenting method was to use his ability whenever they misbehaved, but now he was confused because Maximillian seemed to be... working his way around it.

"Your ability doesn't work anymore," Michael said.

Everyone looked at him in shock, that he would suddenly say that, that he could try it, and then new hysteria washed over them, that he could take away a part of themselves at any point in their lives.

It didn't work.

Michael already said no one can take your power away from you.

The pact was sealed.

Maximillian was betrayed by his father, his hero, and now more than ever he wanted to fix what he had done. He looked at the corpse of his brother and tried saying the magic words, once again.

Abra Cadaver.

Everyone shrieked, Vivian and a few of them ran inside the house, but Mickey was still dead. His body was now decomposing at an alarming rate, his stomach distending in the hot summer air, the gas of the bacteria inside of him filling him up.

Sara let go of her son's cape, she turned away from him and refused to look at him. Michael considered bringing his son back from the dead, but his body was now so rotten, whatever life his soul would have inside of it would not be worth living.

"Let's go inside," Michael said quietly.

"I'm staying with him," Sara said.

"With me," Maximillian asked.

"No. The other one. "

He was no longer the baby, and Maximillian had lost all favor with his mother. He was another giant, she was a dwarf, and she did not dare look at him, because he was the most malignant of them all, his very gaze would mean her glass body would shatter.

She cried, looking into the sky, and more terror came over her once their pet returned home. He flew in circles trying to find the best spot to land, and skidded to a halt, tearing up his personal section of the garden they gave to him for his landing zone.

Santos emerged from the garden to see Mickey, dead on the ground, his stomach distended to a ridiculous size, Maximillian in a cape, his chin covered in blood, and Michael trying to get his wife to stop screaming.

She was tearing the grass, pleading that she should have died instead, and Santos for once had no witty comebacks, no jokes, no snarky remarks. He was filthy, shirtless, mud up to his knees, his sneakers ruined from his landing, and only in blue shorts.

It was his usual appearance, and he planned on showering once he returned, but there was no need to shower just yet.

"What hap—"

As his mouth was opened, Mickey's stomach exploded his corpse popping, an infected pimple. Bits of it got into his mouth, and Santos promptly turned, kneeled over, and threw up.

Blood poured out of Santo's mouth and his tears were red, nourishing the dirt. His beautiful voice made even his retches sound even more pronounced than normal, the sound loud a deafening speaker system.

Michael had seen plenty in the war to not be disturbed by festering corpses; he had thrown many exploding corpses himself, but the rejection of blood made him eject his early breakfast along with Santos.

Sara was too close, the recipient of his disgust, and she screamed, pushed him off, and onto their son's corpse. The second magic phrase has caused the body to decompose even faster, so when Michael fell onto it, his son's head popped along with his abdomen, underneath his father's back.

The screaming and groaning made everyone return outside, and Maximillian was the only one not crying, but standing, watching everyone, covered in blood and bits of organs, his cape so bloody it was sticking to his back.

"Are you okay," Rico asked.

Maximillian nodded yes.

"Nothing's wrong. Everything's fine."

His older siblings did not see his mother's mantra as calming, but now as horribly inappropriate, and Maximillian was too young, too confused to understand a different coping mechanism or a way to communicate his shock and horror.

Santos stood up, spat the blood out of his mouth, and looked at the small child, the child they gave him the honor of naming, in his little cape and good church clothes, vomit and blood pooling around his feet, and hissed .

He thought it was only fitting the child he named would turn out to be a monster.