Fool Bloom (A Magical Woman Quest)

A/N: This was a crossover Omake I wrote for Shadell's A Little Vice, which I'm now crossposting here. That story is framed like it's inside the episodes of a Magical Girl show, hence its in-universe existnce. Since I wrote this for people not familiar with Fool Bloom I do take a bit of time reintroducing concepts:


"Shining Virtue what?" Koyomi Arisugawa was left muttering.

"Shining Virtue Angelic Heart! Kirakira Bitoku Tenshi no Kokoro!" Miyako Nozawa said, for some reason feeling the need to say its title in both English and Japanese, despite her 'unique' pronunciation of the former language. "You don't know it? C'mon, it's one of the classic 00s Magical Girl anime, and you're the real deal! How could you not have to heard of it?"

Miyako and Koyomi were an odd sight on first glance, given Koyomi was twice as old as the college age Miyako. And with Miyako being a bespectacled, befreckled dirty blonde in a dainty dress and Koyomi a messy auburn brunette in a tattered coat, you'd correctly assume they had no family relation. But how could Miyako not hang around Koyomi, an actual Magical Girl? Well, Woman. 'Hanazakari' to use the correct term.

"I'm a war veteran! You think I'd seek out fiction that reminded me of everything I went through?" Koyomi asked, slumping down on a chair in exasperation. An appropriately musty old chair for her musty old house too. "The one exception was that book about being a Hanazakari my first publisher made me write, which I'd do anything to forget."

"Oh yeah, that. Would still be cool if you'd at least show me that book," Miyako muttered, then said, "But don't worry, this was in that time just after the Frost Decade when anime was trying not to be too close to actual magical girl experiences."

"So it's sugarcoated then? Meddling from RUNE's propaganda arm no doubt," Koyomi said, crossing her arms.

Miyako groaned, I know she's a war veteran, but does she really have to always be like this? Not everything lighthearted is propaganda, y'know. Trying to keep positive, she then asked, "Well, didn't you watch older Magical Girl shows back when you were a kid, pre-Frost Fair? Maybe think of it like that."

"I did, yes," Koyomi had to admit, then reached back into the fog of memory, "Would've been the era of Minky Momo and Creamy Mami, think I got those titles right. I remember the Sally and Akko revivals a little better, even if my kid self didn't know they were revivals back then."

"Hah, see! You were into Magical Girl shows at one point weren't you, Arisugawa-sama?" Miyako smirked and pointed like she'd achieved some great victory. "Besides, you're an author. Shouldn't you be taking in all sorts of stories for inspiration, hmm?"

"...Miyako, one of my best-known novels is about an addicted WW2 pilot on the run, I doubt Angelic Shining Heart Virtue will be quite in my wheelhouse," Koyomi said, before she sighed, "Alright, one or two episodes. Let's get this over with."

Barely able to stop herself from squealing with delight, Miyako opened up Koyomi's laptop and asked, "Awesome. So, what's your password for streaming services? The show's on a few of them, well, last I checked it was."

"Do you just ask anyone that?" Koyomi frowned at her. "And I only to subscribe to two, one for classic movies and one for foreign. Afraid you may be fresh out of luck."

Those words made Miyako twitch, but she took a breath and said, "Okay, totally not a problem. Just have to, ahem, improvise is all." She then searched YouTube and found, "Alright, so they've taken down the original KiraKokoro. But we've got the English dub still up... which yeah I failed all my classes in. Again, it's cool, I remember more than enough about the show to fill you in on it anyway!" As for whether watching on YouTube was a grey area, well given Koyomi's bad blood with RUNE, Miyako doubted that'd concern her much.

"I'd like to think I have a decent grasp of the language," Koyomi said, "Wanted to know what translators were doing to my books."
Once Miyako hit play, Koyomi quickly tensed up at the intro. "...I take it our Japanese original didn't have a hip-hop opening number," she said.

"Er, you kinda know you sound like an old lady when you say that?" Miyako asked her. Once the intro ended, she then paused the episode and went, "Okay, so these are the Angelic Saints, Castitas Shirushi Aimi, Diligentia Oyama Katsumi, and Temperentia Shimizu Sei. Or Inessa, Ida, and Temperance as the English dub calls them."

"What, was America worried about getting Japanese cooties?" Koyomi said at the names.

"Well, y'know, that's just how English dubs were like back then," Miyako said while biting her lower lip. "Anyway, don't think the fandom cares for Castitas much, 'cause she's the leader so people think that makes her boring. Bleh. Definitely agree though that Temperentia's the best Saint."

"As an actual Magical Girl, believe me that I've had some rough experiences with so-called 'leaders'. This Castitas seems fine to me though," Koyomi said, but then had to remark, "'Temperentia' though? What, did this show have an episode warning against underage drinking?"

"...Can't we just watch the episode?" Miyako had to ask.

The episode moved forward to show the girls' regular school lives, at which Koyomi said, "Take it this is set pre-Veil being shred then? Else there would've been a Frost Fair drill or PSA about how anyone could be one of them by now if this was a real school, or whoever the show uses instead of the Frost Fair."

"The bad guys are the Abyssal Forest, we're gonna get to them," Miyako told her, before she paused when Michael opposed her head out of Inessa's backpack, "Okay, that's the Archangel Michael, she gave the Saints their powers, kinda like the Dandelionhearts. And those are Lupin and Noir, they're the bad guys I was talking about. Avaritia Wolf and Superbia Dragon."

"Weren't you the one that said, 'Can't we just watch'?" Koyomi had to bring up, then got to musing. "All these Sin and Virtue names are getting too Christian for me. Were I in change, first thing I'd do is get everything back to Judaism instead. Name everyone after the Sephiroth and Qliphoth instead or something." Koyomi had a Jewish maternal grandmother, having been in Imperial Japan's Shanghai Ghetto. "Okay, if they had to Americanise anything, did they at least make one of the characters Jewish? Like her, she looks Jewish."

Miyako got confused for a second by the name 'Sephiroth', but then said. "Well, I guess you could always headcanon one of the characters as Jewish. Like I'm trans, so I used to headcanon heaps of characters as trans." Including a certain someone about to show up.

"I have no idea what a 'headcanon' is. Sound painful if anything," Koyomi said, but softened her tone with, "I think I get what you mean. Interpreting characters to be like you when the media won't give you them. You're already learning Death of the Author."

"Er, but aren't you alive?" Miyako asked, not understanding that term in return, leaving Koyomi to groan.
Avaritia then took a chalkboard and infused it with Sin, the newly created board monster and its chalk minions ganging up one of the girls' classmates. "Okay, so that's a Resinner, they're the monsters of each episode. And that's C, who the Angelic Saints always have to rescue," Miyako said.

"Huh, just like me with Asahi," Koyomi observed, spoiling the mood with, "which just left her traumatized and resentful. And this Avaritia just sends out a monster to attack? Doesn't this Forest try to create a new game console or restaurant or concert hall to suck up everyone's emotions first? That's how the Frost Fair did it."

"Wait, I thought you didn't want to be reminded of the Frost Fair?" Miyako asked with narrowed eyes. "And here they steal away people's virtues, not emotions. Though I guess they're kinda related." And er, funny you say that about your old friend Higashi-sama what with C.

With the Saints fighting back, Koyomi saw their powers of fire, earth, and water and went, "So, no darkness then? Wait, don't tell me, that's what the villains get, isn't it?" Darkness of course happened to be Koyomi's own Hanazakari power.

'I'm sure they, er, meant no offence," Miyako feebly offered.

The Angelic Saints defeating the Resinner and returning to their ordinary lives for now, Koyomi said about the episode, "Well, I can only hope the Saints' own Masquerade doesn't break, that's when things went from bad to worse. And alright, you've at least convinced me to check out our Japanese original when I can," even if her tone suggested that'd be out of spite.

Miyako tried to smile, since that still went better than she expected. Though I bet Arisugawa-sama would've found an excuse to complain no matter what, she thought.
"Of course, if you really want the full experience, you have to get involved with the fandom. Here, I'll bring up Tumblr," she then said, only for Koyomi to immediately glare at her.

"Absolutely not. I make a point of never interacting with fanbases when I can," Koyomi said.

Given what a MG fangirl she was, Miyako really, really hoped that wasn't directed at her. "Well, don't you at least wanna see the OCs I made?" she asked.

"What, do they have 'omegaverse dynamics' too?" Koyomi said as she rolled her eyes. "I've read your 'real person fanfic' My Chemical Valentine, I am already well aware how you characterise."

"Oh, that's okay," Miyako said. Fine, be like that, she thought. It was then however a thought came her way, "Hey Arisugawa-sama, is there a Hanazakari who can teleport people into fiction?"

"What are you planning?" Koyomi instantly asked. "None I know of, but given what's within the scope of a Hanazakari's powers, going in and out of dreams for one infamous example, someone somewhere could be capable of that."

"I just thought, well, maybe you'd like to experience a world where Magical Girls have it better beyond just watching them. Well, relatively better. Since you've been through it all, you could even give the Saints some pointers," Miyako said.

"You're hoping Michael will make you a Magical Girl, aren't you?" Koyomi asked, Miyako blushing too much to given answer.
"Okay, first thing is I am not one for babysitting teenagers, even fictional ones. Second is," she then said, "you do realise escapist fictional worlds are only escapist because we don't actually live in them?"

"Yeah well, people would've thought the Frost Fair invasion fictional till it actually happened. So maybe we're already living in one and just don't realise it, hmm?"

"Oh, and I suppose the Angelic Saints are the ones watching shows about us, are they?" Koyomi said, while she couldn't help smiling a little.