Naomi Thrussell adjusted her headset and placed her copy of the Arcanexus grimoire on the desk next to her. It was company policy to keep the manual within reach at all times, even if she knew it by heart. She stretched her arms out in front of her, cracking her knuckles. Any minute now, the lines would open.
       It was a fascinating job, protecting aspiring idiots from themselves. Her coworkers in the tech support division all had that dull, glaze-eyed look to them. To them, it was a paycheck. But not for her. Even answering the same customer questions over and over was fascinating. This was very real and still relatively new magic. Besides, she wouldn't be keeping the job too long—not with the big plans she was making. The research she was able to do from her desk, on those calls, was invaluable.
       The light on her desk phone flashed green, marking the first call of the day. She pressed the button and took on a sweet, understanding tone.
       "Arcanexus Technical Support, how can I help you today?"
       A man answered, straining to speak over some raucous animal in the background. It sounded like he was in a barn.
       "Yeah, hey. I'm having problems with one of your spells."
       "May I please have the name of the incantation you tried?"
       The man lowered his voice to a whisper.
       "Uh, I was making…"
       Naomi turned up the volume on her headset. It was difficult to hear him over the cacophony. She finally placed the noise as mooing and angry snorting.
       "You'll have to speak up, sir."
       "A virility potion! I used the Everlasting Energy potion recipe. But it wasn't enough, so I added some of the enchantment lines from Bull's Strength."
       "Ah, I see. And now you have a bull's head sticking out of your body?"
       The mooing continued and the snorting grew more insistent, as if to challenge anyone and everyone to a fight.
       "More than one. I drank a lot of it."
       Naomi braided her fingers as she leaned back in her chair. Home brews were predictably annoying. She considered the different variations that would make a potion strong enough to turn a man's body into a raging stampede.
       The victim shouted for the bull heads to shut up. His voice was growing weary.
       "Are you still there? Can you help me? Please?"
       "We'll get you out of this, sir, but you have to do everything I say exactly how I say it."
       Naomi jotted down a list. She cross-referenced the grimoire's appendix of side effects, just to make sure she hadn't missed anything. It was woefully incomplete, missing at least one that she'd thought of. But, she guessed that was all the better for her. She would sell her book to every amateur magic-user, once it was finished.
       "Sir? Are you ready? You might want to write this down."
       "Yeah, yeah. Just hurry! I think they're trying to stampede."
       "Okay, here is what you'll need to do. First, drink some warm milk. While drinking, listen to two lullabies simultaneously in reverse. Once that's done, perform the cattle dog variation of the Hound Week spell. That should drive the bulls out."
       There was a heavy sigh on the other end.
       "Is this the only way? You're sure I'll have to be a dog? For a whole week?"
       "I'm sorry sir. There's a reason Arcanexus warns against home brews. Don't worry, you'll be back to normal very soon. You may have the urge to eat grass for a few days afterward, but the bulls shouldn't come back. Oh, and make sure you have a friend or relative who can let you out and walk you until you're yourself again."
       The man sputtered like he was going to demand to speak with her manager. Not that it would help. This was his only option, really. All the other counterspells she could have recommended would put him in the hospital. Thankfully, he didn't argue. There was a muttered thank you followed by a click.
       Naomi filled in the details of the call. One copy for Arcanexus's files, and another for her own. She eavesdropped on her coworkers in the call center while waiting for her light to flash again. There was a kid who accidentally made her brother disappear and had to get him back before their parents got home. Another caller had gotten impatient with a gardening spell and performed the incantation five times in a row. Apparently, the growth was too aggressive for his taste; his house was now covered with carnivorous tomatoes.
       She made it a little game with each overheard problem. How would she fix them? How would the company fix them? She considered the game won if she came up with a better solution than Arcanexus. It was practice like this that kept her on top of her game. Her roommate was constantly annoyed with her over it; while Hana was naturally gifted, she hated magic. She said it smelled terrible, which was the oddest thing Naomi had ever heard. She guessed the real reason was that Hana was afraid of messing up and needing the tech support line. Her roommate wouldn't have to worry about her wounded pride much longer. The book Naomi was writing would be perfect for her.
       Naomi accepted her next call eagerly. She was ready for more research for a good cause. The book she was writing wasn't just a better grimoire. It was devoted to magical mistakes and how to fix them. With all the calls the tech support center got, she was bound to rake in millions from the sales. Maybe she would use the money to open a magic tutoring business? She smiled as her thoughts buzzed with possibilities.
       She quickly cleared her throat as a coworker walked by, and answered the call.
       "Arcanexus Technical Support, how can I help you today?"
       "I've got a portal problem," a woman's raspy voice snarled. "It's an Arcanexus Multi."
       Ah. One of those. There was a faulty portal every other week.
       "Have you tried sealing it and opening it again?"
       "Oh, we're way beyond that point. It's unstable and—" The woman turned away from the phone to yell. "Great flaming monkeys!"
       Naomi winced and pulled the earpiece away from her head.
       "Ma'am? What exactly is coming through the portal?"
       "I just told you! Monkeys! On fire! Blue fire!"
       Naomi resisted the urge to bury her face in her palms. Why were there even portals in the grimoire? Nobody ever summoned anything good.
       "I'm going to need you to hang up and call emergency magical services right away."
       There was a shrieking on the other end, followed by the whoosh of a fire extinguisher.
       "I did that. The monkeys ate their portal expert! Last thing he said was to call tech support."
       Naomi tapped her fingers against the edge of her desk.
       "Okay. Let's start from the beginning then. How big is the portal?"
       "Five feet? No. Six. It's getting bigger."
       Crap. That was never a good sign. The Multi version of Arcanexus's portals connected to at least a thousand dimensions, many completely uncharted. Its biggest weakness was to backdoor attacks.
       "It sounds like your portal might have been hacked in order to summon malicious beings. You need to manually shut down the gateway. The best way to do that is to—"
       The woman let out a raspy scream. The phone clattered to the floor. Double crap. A steadily growing portal was pouring out monsters from an unknown dimension. If a computer got a virus, a really good hacker could take down some local infrastructure. If a spell got hacked by interdimensional warlocks, you had maybe a day or two before you had to find a new world to live on. Just another reason to take portals out of the grimoire entirely. She loved magic, yes, but responsible magic. Portals were anything but.
       Naomi typed up a quick summary, hit send, then tore off her headset. She ran to her boss's office. He was poring over the new incantations the company was adding in the next edition. She stood in his open doorway, shoving her jacket on. It was unusual for tech support employees to go out into the field, but her boss typically made an exception for her, considering she had prior experience.
       "We've got an emergency portal situation. I emailed you the location."
       Her boss set down the book. As he read the notes she sent, his mouth pulled into a deep frown.
       "Go see what you can do. I'll call emergency services, see if we can't get a few portal experts to meet you there. Or, a few more, it seems? You better hurry. I'll call you a cab."
       With the boss's blessing, Naomi raced out. She used to be EMS, riding in to save the day when someone got in over their heads magic-wise. She'd been studying to be a normal paramedic when the first grimoires came out. She was instantly fascinated by magic. It only took one spell to know this was what she was meant for. She studied the three available grimoires from cover to cover. That whole first year, magic was in the news, and not because it was amazing. So many people were hurting themselves. Her instructors knew she was dabbling in magic and recommended her to Chicago's brand new Emergency Magical Services unit.
       She stuck with that for a few years, but she eventually quit. It took a toll on her, seeing so many cases that were too far gone to help. In tech support, she had a chance to save spellcasters before things got out of hand. She hoped that wasn't the case today. She really enjoyed her life and this planet. She didn't want it to end just yet.
       Naomi stopped by the convenience store at the end of the block. A minute later, she ran out again with five ice cream bars, a large bag of ice, a few scarves, and a bunch of bananas. She managed to free a couple fingers to signal to the cab that, yes, she was the person they were supposed to pick up. The driver looked her over as she dumped her supplies onto the seat next to her.
       The call had shown up on the map as being in a run-down industrial center two towns over. She gave him an address she hoped would be close enough, and told him to hurry.
       The cab driver flashed a bemused grin as he started driving.
       "Scarves I get; it's not spring yet. But ice too?"
       Naomi busied herself with tying the scarves together.
       "Polar bear fur is scarce this far south." When his confused expression didn't go away, Naomi offered a simpler answer. "It's for magic."
       The driver's eyes bugged. His smile disappeared. He ignored Naomi for the rest of the trip, only nervously glancing in the rear-view mirror once or twice. She didn't blame the man for being nervous. There were a lot of amateurs running around. The tech support line proved this point.
       The first real, functional grimoire was only published five or so years ago by a secretive company called Thaumaturgical. Everyone thought it was a joke at first. Magic wasn't real, unless you counted kooks who danced around calling themselves witches or the guys on stage pulling rabbits from hats. Within a month, two more companies had popped up with their own versions. Arcanexus included some really powerful spells in theirs, and quickly rose to the top. Nobody could really tell how these companies had discovered real magic, but they had and there was no going back.
       Some countries outlawed the grimoires and had big bonfire parties to destroy what they couldn't understand. Religions around the world denounced it as the work of devils, but that just made believers spin off magic-centric cults. All of the suppression didn't stop everyone from hobbyists to government agencies trying their hand creating something amazing and miraculous.
       Naomi was glad she lived in a place where curiosity was encouraged. But she was careful, too. She studied each grimoire a hundred times over before attempting even the simplest spells. She smiled, thinking back to when she left her Arcanexus grimoire open to a high level incantation that was supposed to lift heavy objects. She'd gone out to the library to get books on poetry so she wouldn't mess up the cadence that she just couldn't get right. By the time Naomi got home, the fridge, couch, TV, and coffee table were all bobbing six inches above the floor. It was the first and last time her roommate had tried magic. Naomi found Hana hiding in the bathroom with cotton balls stuffed up her nose, gargling her fourth cup of Listerine. She refused to fix the furniture because the magic smelled so bad, so Naomi got a crash course in helping others with their spells. It took all night, and a few more trips to the library, but she got everything back in its rightful place. It was immensely rewarding. That challenge was how she'd known for sure that EMS, and then tech support, were right for her.
       Naomi peered out the window. A pillar of smoke rose out of an abandoned warehouse ahead. That had to be it. She glanced over at the bag of ice slowly melting on the seat next to her. She was glad she bought the largest size.
       "You can drop me off right up there."
       He nodded silently, and she saw his shoulders relax. She paid the driver, gathered up the supplies, and hopped out of the cab. As soon as he was paid, the driver sped off. He didn't even wait for her to close the door. Apparently, she would be getting a different ride back to the office.
       She followed the smoke and sounds of shrieking primates to the source. On the second floor was a massive flaming disc eleven feet wide. Monkeys composed of blue fire swung from the exposed beams of the ceiling. Larger fire-beasts were emerging now: boars with tusks like torches. They fought one another in front of the portal.
       Naomi snuck closer. She could see the bodies of the initial emergency response team, but everyone she saw was wearing a uniform. The caller was missing. She snuck closer, glancing around the room for danger and the caller both. Off to the right a woman in a singed, floral skirt hid behind some sheet metal scraps, hugging a grimoire tight to her chest. That had to be the caller. At least the monkeys hadn't gotten her too.
       Naomi reached a cement column twenty feet away from the portal. Sirens wailed in the distance. The sound sent the monkeys into a frenzy. They scrambled to the windows, charring the floor as they went. The fireboars chased the monkeys in a blind rage for the offense of attracting their attention. Monsters like that didn't care what they destroyed, so long as it was violent.
       She emerged from her hiding place and ripped the bag of ice open. She dumped it out in as wide a circle as it would make. The ice cream bars took the place of candles in the ritual. She twisted the tied-together scarves into the right arcane shapes, and started chanting.
       At first, nothing happened. She worried that the initial portal was too hot. Or that her summoning circle was melting too quickly.
       One of the monkeys glanced over. It screamed. Soon, the whole troop rushed toward her with flaming teeth bared. The boars grunted fiercely, preparing to charge.
       Naomi threw the bananas and continued chanting. The monkeys were distracted for a second, but it didn't last. Sweat dripped down the sides of her face. Her spell had to work, or everyone was done for. Her backup was still too far away.
       Just then, the scarves began glowing green and yellow like the northern lights. The fireboars jostled one another as they charged. A cool gust swirled around Naomi. She glanced over to make sure the caller was still hiding. Then, she stepped back a few feet behind her summoning circle. An icy portal opened in the air above the circle. It was a dimension completely devoid of life, and as cold as distant Pluto in the nighttime.
       The fire animals scattered, but not quickly enough. Icy winds blasted the creatures, sapping their life. Blue flame turned to orange, then shrank away until the beasts were nothing but piles of ash.
       A team of emergency magical services ran in as the last boar was snuffed out. They hurried over to offer assistance. Naomi was grateful. The creatures might be gone, but the portal was still growing. The heat threatened to extinguish the smaller ice portal.
       Any successful magic was one part spell and one part user. Naomi and the five EMS officers all stood behind the ice portal, strengthening it with a chorus of incantations. This was not a trick for novices. Without a precise balance of hot and cold, the two portals could rip apart reality itself. She would be dedicating an entire chapter of her book to the many, many reasons summoning portals was the worst idea.
       Their combined strength focused the extreme cold of the counter-portal so that it fed directly into the fiery one. Steam filled the room. The offending portal shrank down to just a few feet across. Naomi raced over and kicked a hole in the chalked outline of the fire portal's summoning circle.
       The hacked portal vanished. Scorch marks around the warehouse were the only evidence that it had ever been there. The emergency response team converged on the ex-portal. If they were good, and they seemed so, they would trace the portal hack back to whatever interdimensional jerk was responsible for the attempted destruction of Earth and bring him to justice.
       Naomi picked up two of the ice cream bars and unwrapped them, causing the other portal to disappear as well. They were still mostly intact. She took a bite out of one and walked over to the caller. She offered the second bar to the still-terrified woman.
       "Arcanexus recommends checking that you trust the dimension you're summoning from in the future. Cool?"
       The woman's hands shook as she accepted the ice cream.
       "Sh-sure. Yeah."
       Naomi pulled a survey card out of her jacket pocket.
       "Oh, and if you're happy with your tech support experience, I'd really appreciate if you took a minute to fill out our customer satisfaction survey."