Impatient pacing rang through the Professor’s office, his shoes giving off a distinct ‘clank’ every time he turned around, not being able to walk further – the bookshelves on either side of the wall stopping him.

“Where is he…?” asked the gruff looking man. Scratching his beard while standing still for a moment, fixating his gaze onto the door. When his apprentice didn’t open the door after a minute of staring he turned back to the big wooden desk. Disheveled papers hiding every bit of the surface, some even with ink stains from little accidents of being too excited. “Now, Is everything in order?”

Hands searching for an open book in which all the requirements were written down in order for this experiment to be a success. It would make travel so much easier and safer, young mages could even be able to work as special couriers, hopping from one point of the realm to another. Capitol to the southernmost monastery in only a few seconds. Just where did that damn stone go? Even after throwing almost every last bit of parchment on the floor, the jewel the Professor was looking for was nowhere to be seen. “I’m sure it was supposed to be on my desk! Did that rascal take it with him?”

Unbeknownst to the man, a small commotion occurred on the other side of the door in which his apprentice collided with another group of students, papers and bags getting mixed up into a giant heap. “I am so sorry!” The young red headed boy yelped, frantically grabbing leather bag he dropped. “I’d love to help you, so so sorry. I gotta go!” One foot slipping on limestone floor. His breathing became almost erratic, every two or three steps almost falling again.

“Professor!” The door burst open, the stumbling freckled red-head panting with his hands resting on his knees leaning forward.

“Did you get everything, Gerrit?”

Giving a toothy lopsided smile Gerrit held up his bag. “All in here.”

Luckily Gerrit’s position as the Professor’s assistant was well known across the Academia’s faculty. Otherwise getting all the ingredients from the storage room would’ve been impossible. Without a good reason access to the Academia’s storage was limited, even for a fifth term student. “Finally! We can begin!”

Just minutes later chalk drawings and even decorated the office floor. The smell of crushed bugs and dried flowers started to spread. While the Professor checked every drawing two and three times over Gerrit was tasked with crushing the ingredients. Dutifully he kept mixing and crushing, focused not to do anything wrong.

“How much longer, boy?”

“Just a few seconds!” Both of them grew anxious, maybe for different reason than the other mage. The young shaky hands handed over the stone bowl. “Sir…are you sure it will work this time?”

Silence came over them, the only sounds being rustling papers and a scratching beard. “Everything is in order…” Thoughtful the papers with diagrams and lists rustled one last time. By now the bowl stood in front of the chalk drawings. “Just…where in tarnation is that stupid arcane stone.”

“Did you seriously lose it?” Gerrit began giggling, his eyes scanning the room. A mess of books, papers and glasses.

“Gerrit! Shut up and help me searching!”

Immediately the youngster stopped giggling and began searching every shelf, the small tea table under the window, beneath the comfortable chairs and lastly he even crouched down to take a look under the Professor’s desk. “I found it!” A hand emerged holding a faintly teal crystal the size of a giant dewberry.

“Goodness gracious you are my lucky charm.” Instead of talking to the boy the man rather grabbed the gem, smiling all over.

“You are welcome” mumbled the boy observing the Professor taking of his amulet. One day Gerrit would wear such a primal stone himself!

“Ready yourself, my boy.” The Professor stood with stretched arm towards the chalk drawings, his hand and the bowl aligned, the stone slowly glowing. It was always exciting to see the man who graciously accepted him as his assistant perform magic. The air seemed to change around the stone, getting a bit thinner and blurry and a slight hue of blue. Even though most experiments so far were failures with either nothing happening or a small air current blowing through the room or a tiny firecracker like explosion in the middle of the chalk occurring Gerrit stood behind the chair of his teacher. This time the man was so sure of himself that even Gerrit began to expect results.

Gerrit knew better than to disturb the Professor’s focus but a question popped into his head: “Wouldn’t it be better to do this outside?”

A blue hue enveloped the whole office, which was visible from the outside. This was it, the moment he had been working towards for 10 years. The Professor started research on teleportation and portals in his last year of school and never stopped since, blowing up many huts and caves, starting some fires in corn fields and finally getting his name spread as ‘The mad Professor’. Even though all of this was well known the headmaster of Academia offered him a position as researcher and teacher. The chalk drawings began to start emitting light of their own, the crushed ingredients swirling around in the bowl. Suddenly everything changed. All the blue vanished turning into a deep purple. Smoke rose from bowl, powder burning. At last a swirling mess of purple water flowing upwards, bulging outwards and coming together above the circles almost two meter in height.

“We did it Gerrit!” screamed the teacher, almost joyful. Even though he had predicted that he would be able to see the other side, the destination of the portal he was more than satisfied with this result.

Not even two seconds after Gerrit opened his eyes again the water began to waver. Something was… coming through? In the next moment a young boy, almost Gerrit’s age crashed into one of the bookshelves riding a dwarven metal horse. The portal vanished in an instant, only leaving the office in a bigger state of disarray. Curious both the Professor and his assistant got closer to the boy. His dwarven machinery looked weird, nothing he ever saw compared to it. The messenger bag on his side was a bit crumpled and the boy himself completely knocked out from his collision with the collected and bound knowledge.

“Did we… succeed?”

What were those weird blue pants? Did they get ripped the crash? Those shoes looked colorful. From Gerrit’s point of view he looked completely out of place.

“Let’s first get this boy to a healer.” The Professor tried to pick up the boy but his right leg was stuck under the machine.

“Of course!” Gerrit expected the machinery to be a lot heavier than it actually was. While both of them walked through the halls of Academia Gerrit got a good look at the boy’s face. It was a bit dusty and a few scratches from the splintered wood were visible but other than that he had to say, “What a cute boy…” 

A/N: Please don't forget to like and subscribe, maybe leave a nice comment. Your words are the only thing that keeps me going.