The experiments resumed after that.
"Okay, Invisibility," Aaron said. "Why does it affect your clothes but not things you're holding?"
Magnus blinked. "I've never thought about that."
"It's a significant data point. The power boundary is either contact-based, identity-based, or intent-based. If it's contact, anything touching your skin goes invisible. But then held objects should also go invisible. So it's probably not contact."
"Unless held objects count as a different category of contact," Ethan said.
"Which would suggest it's intent-based. You intend your clothes to be part of you, you don't intend held objects the same way."
"Speaking of intent, why do you think he can't make other things go invisible?" Ethan scratched his chin.
"You're thinking about Sue Storm again?"
"I mean, if he's using invisible constructs and invisible force fields for Telekinesis, imagine what he could do if he could apply Invisibility to them as well."
"Well, I can't as far as I can tell," Magnus said.
"Right, and you said you only have three charges a day?" Aaron asked.
"Yeah."
"Then we need a design that doesn't waste those charges for nothing. Let's move on to something else first."
"Friction control then, or whatever your System calls it." Ethan jabbed his thumb toward the wall behind himself. "Spider-Man?"
"That's not a test design," Aaron protested.
"It's a hypothesis. A testable one. If friction control works on his own hands and feet, he can climb the wall. If it only works on external surfaces, he can't. Simple binary outcome." Ethan looked at Magnus. "Can you make your hands and feet sticky?"
Magnus looked at his hands, then walked toward the house. He put his palm flat against the exterior wall and focused on Oppositional Resistance Alteration. Then he lifted his hand experimentally, and his hand was slightly harder to pull away than it should have been.
"Oh," he said.
"Oh?" Ethan said.
"I think it's working."
What followed was, by any objective measure, undignified. Magnus pressed both hands against the wall and experimentally took one foot off the ground and set it onto the wall, then the other. The increased friction held him — barely, then better as he concentrated — and he got approximately three feet off the ground before his concentration broke. He dropped back to the sand and landed on his butt.
"Spider-Man," Ethan said reverently.
"It needs work," Magnus said, brushing sand off his pants.
"It needs practice," Ethan corrected. "That's what training is for."
"He's not wrong," Miguel said.
They all looked at him.
"Seriously," Miguel continued. "You've been using these powers reactively since you got them. You've never just… practiced. Like, practiced for the sake of getting better, not because something was going wrong." He shrugged. "That's how you get good at things. You practice when nothing is on the line."
"Well, Miguel's been consistently making good points," Aaron observed after a moment of silence.
"You said the same thing about me," Ethan noted.
"No, I said you'd made a lot of good points today. Miguel consistently does it. There's a difference."
"Okay, that's definitely an insult."
Magnus cleared his throat loudly, then turned to Miguel. "You're right. I've never just… tried to get better at any of this. I've only ever used them when I needed to." He rubbed the back of his neck. "That's probably a problem."
"It's definitely a problem," Aaron said. "But now you know. So." He looked at the wall. "Again?"
Magnus looked at the wall. Then back at the other guys.
"If I fall," he said, "one of you is catching me."
"Miguel's the strongest," Ethan said immediately.
"Or," Miguel offered, "we could just get a tarp, a trampoline, or an inflatable bed or something?"
"See? Consistently reliable." Aaron jabbed his thumb at Miguel.
They found an inflatable trampoline and placed it at the base of the wall where Magnus was going to practice wall-crawling. Then he started again.
He made it about four feet up the wall this time before his concentration started wavering. Then, he heard a gravelly voice next to him:
"That's not how you climb a wall, young wanderer."
Magnus nearly lost his grip and fell from the wall. He turned to see Tony hanging on it right next to him, completely at ease, like the exterior of a two-and-a-half story beach house was a perfectly reasonable place to have a conversation.
The raccoon looked at him with visible disappointment. "Kid, your form is embarrassment to raccoon-kind. Even baby raccoons climb better than you."
"Tony, what—how long have you been there?"
"Long enough." Tony tilted his head toward Magnus's hands. "You're gripping like you're afraid of wall. You should grip like you own it."
"Tony, I'm not a raccoon, I am using—"
"But you are climbing walls," Tony cut him off. "Doesn't matter what you're using. Wall is wall. You either own the wall or the wall owns you. Every respectable raccoon knows this." The raccoon demonstrated by releasing one paw entirely and gesturing broadly at the surrounding air with it, hanging from three points of contact without apparent concern. "See? Own it."
"That's not helpful," Magnus said. "You have claws."
"And you have… whatever it is that lets you hang on to walls." He gestured at Magnus's hands and feet. "Same thing in principle."
Below them, Ethan had stopped laughing long enough to start taking a video. Aaron had his arms crossed and appeared to be watching Tony's technique with genuine scientific interest. Miguel was looking up at both of them with an unreadable expression. None of them could understand the conversation Magnus was having, but watching him and Tony chittering at each other was still entertaining among other things.
Then Tony moved. That was the only way to describe it — he moved, and the wall simply agreed with his decision to scale it. Five seconds, maybe six, and he was at the roofline. He looked down at Magnus from above with the air of someone who had made a point and was content to let it settle.
Then he came back down — equally fast, equally effortless — and returned to Magnus's level.
"Now, your turn, kid," Tony said.
"I just watched you do that and I don't feel more capable of doing it," Magnus said.
"Watching is good. Climbing is better. Start moving."
"Tony—"
"Young wanderer." Tony's voice shifted into what Magnus liked to call his dramatic philosopher persona. "I have scaled buildings three times this height. I have done so in rain. I have done so while carrying food—significant food, I might add, a whole chicken wing. I have done so at night." He paused. "Also during the day. Also once during what I believe was an earthquake, though it may have just been a really large truck."
Magnus stared at him.
"The point," Tony continued, "is that walls are not the problem. You are the problem."
"That's not—"
Tony's head snapped sideways. He stared intensely at something in the distance for two full seconds. Then looked back at Magnus. "Sorry. Thought I smelled something. I did not." He refocused with the air of a professor resuming a lecture. "Where was I?"
"I'm the problem," Magnus said flatly.
"Yes! Exactly. You grip like you're asking the wall permission. Walls do not give permission. They simply are." Tony spread his free paw in a philosophical gesture. "Be like the wall."
"That doesn't mean anything."
"It means everything." Tony looked at him seriously. "Also your left hand is slipping."
Magnus's left hand slipped. He grabbed back on.
"See?" Tony said.
Below them, Ethan had given up on science entirely and was just filming. Aaron had sat down on the inflatable trampoline, apparently having concluded that whatever was happening above him was beyond the scope of the experiment but worth observing anyway. Miguel was watching with his arms crossed, expression still unreadable.
"Again," Tony said. "But this time, don't think about your hands."
"I have to think about my hands, that's how the power—"
"Don't think about your hands," Tony repeated firmly. "Think about where you're going. The hands will follow. This is true of climbing. This is true of life. This is also true of finding food, though for food you must also use your nose, which you humans are tragically bad at." He sniffed once in demonstration. "Someone down there has chips."
"Tony, focus—"
"I am focused. I am also aware of the chips." He looked at Magnus. "These are not mutually exclusive. This is advanced awareness. You will learn it eventually." He tilted his head. "Probably."
Magnus exhaled through his nose and started climbing again.
He made it another three feet this time before his concentration wavered. Tony appeared beside him having relocated without Magnus noticing.
"Better," Tony said.
Magnus nearly slipped again. "Stop doing that!"
"Part of training," Tony said, entirely unbothered. "You must be able to climb and be surprised simultaneously. The world does not pause for your concentration."
"I'm on a wall, and you're trying to give me a heart attack—"
"I keep telling you, kid. Pay attention to your surroundings," Tony said. "Also—" His nose twitched. "—those are definitely chips. Barbecue flavor. Very disrespectful to the nose. Anyway." He turned back to Magnus. "This shall be part of your training from now on. Wall-scaling. Every night, even after we're back to your… campus dorm as you call it."
"Seriously?!"
"Yes, seriously! Scaling walls is very important skill for raccoon-kind." He began descending the wall. "Come. We go again from the bottom. And this time—" He paused mid-descent, distracted by something only he could detect, then dropped to the ground, apparently investigating a crack in the paving stones with intense academic focus. A few seconds later, he seemed to have determined whatever he was looking for wasn't there and returned to the base of the wall.
"This time," he resumed, as though nothing had happened, "try to reach the roof. The tall angry human you call your mate—girlfriend, whatever—lives on the third floor back in your campus. Her window's about the same height as the roof here. You should aim to at least reach her window."
Magnus, who had climbed back down after him, stopped. "Why do I need to reach Alex's window specifically?"
Tony looked at him. "Because it would be romantic."
"That's not—Tony, I'm not going to—"
"It is also good practice for emergency situations," Tony added. "What if she needed rescuing from the third floor? Would you leave her there because you cannot climb?"
"That's not—"
"What if she dropped something out the window?"
"I could just use Telekinesis—"
"What if your—" Tony paused, clearly having run out of scenarios. "What if there were birds," he said finally. "Blocking the stairs. Very aggressive birds."
Magnus stared at him.
"Pigeons," Tony added, with feeling. "Or owls. Or maybe geese."
"Why would there be—" Magnus stopped himself. He closed his eyes and took several deep breaths. "Fine. Whatever. I have to practice this anyway."
"Good," Tony said, already halfway up beside him. "Own the wall."
"You keep saying that."
"Because you keep not doing it."