oh goddess it's been ... it's been something; here is your longest delayed doot in the history of the quest
> [Meguca] Explain why you're here and what you're doing
>> Tell her the local news got footage of a magical girl, and we've been cleaning it up.
>> We were entrusted with this sort of task by Kyuubey. We have useful skills for this.
>> We aren't with Salem Academy despite appearances. We aren't local, and we will leave shortly, without hunting.
> [Meguca] Don't pay her off
"Oh," she says, her voice suddenly growing colder. "I see."
"What's wrong?" you ask.
She looks over at the two of you carefully, probably sizing you up for a fight.
"Nothing," she says, gritting her teeth. "It's just one of your many duties. I just didn't realize he was outsourcing."
"What's her problem?" asks Nanami. "You'd think we weren't doing everyone a favor."
You consider this for a while. After a short while of dealing with a weak data connection to back home, you notice something interesting.
"The jacket she was wearing," you identify to Nanami, "bears the insignia of a local university. I wonder if she might be a student?"
"She's not old enough," objects Nanami.
You frown.
"She could be, though," you say.
"A magical girl's appearance is more determined by her self-image than normal human development and aging processes. Before magical girls were professionalized, there were a few from time to time who just didn't grow up the right way, and had trouble for it. And if she's a university student now, then she's probably been a magical girl for a long time…"
"So you're saying she has a chip on her shoulder, from being treated like a kid?" asks Nanami.
"No, I'm just saying she might simply know enough by now to hate Kyuubey. Did you see how she frowned the moment I said his name?"
"Huh," says Nanami.
"They seem to have a system here. I'll bet that she helps keep it going. If we see her again, we'll have to keep that possibility in mind. Hopefully she hates him more than us."
The first thing that happens when you sneak into Simona's room is that a girl cries out in pain.
"Aaaah," says Ophelia. "Ahh. Ow, ow, ow, ow."
Simona's attention is torn between the two of you, but she quickly tells you to get inside, and shuts the door behind you.
"What's wrong?" you ask.
"Leg. Foot. Everything sore. Ow."
You scoot over to look at her.
She'll be fine. You'll reassure her about how there will be a little discomfort for a while, but the nanites will handle most of it; she might not even need a visit to the medics —
No. No. This isn't a battlefield. She doesn't have nanites. She is a frail and delicate natural human. You suppose this is probably rather bad. With ancient medical technology they might have to amputate… Okay, no, this is the twenty-first century, not the eleventh century.
Her feet are not so good: bruised, swollen, some bleeding. It looks like they've attempted some first aid, though hydrogen peroxide was probably not the best choice to disinfect it.
"You were doing … very sophisticated ballet techniques, with rather unsuitable shoes," you note. "And no physical training. How are your muscles?"
"My muscles are hurt," she laments.
"I can imagine," you say. "You are probably hurting in places you didn't even know you had."
She nods.
It does drive home how ballet is showy and fun, but a brutal business when you get down to it. Perhaps on some level it's like being a magical girl. You should put that in your essay, except that's a rather bad idea to mention specifically, so maybe you should just think on the parallels. Actually, the things Ms. Valentin said about dance sounds like it might apply just as well if she were talking about the sacrifices associated with magic, using some sort of a code or metaphor.
Sakura nudges you.
She feels bad about letting Ophelia get hurt, and wants to help the girl.
"Well then," you say. "The least we can do after all that is to make this better. May I see your ankles?"
With a few seconds and a slight glow of magic, she is much better.
You get a better view of her soul while doing so, and it is in an interesting state. There are some resonances which are much stronger and others which seem to be partially suppressed. It's probably some latent echo of what they were doing earlier to affect her.
Well. You've got some further explaining to do.
"The good news," you tell the girl, "is that you have a latent magical talent for interpretive dance. Unfortunately, it's somewhat out of your control, and there are some aliens who wish to abscond with you."
Well. Really they're much more interested in you, Clarisse, of course, but for the time being, they don't know better.
"Fortunately," you continue, "Simona here might know more about the aliens than anyone else alive."
Simona blinks.
"I… suppose that's so," she says. "I did manage some study outside of what Governance usually performed."
"Could you tell me about it?" you ask.
> Ask Simona about working with Homura
According to Simona, the core of the work she was tasked with was related to the Ceph: oft repeated diplomatic missions that didn't seem to go anywhere, but also scouting missions into deep space, well outside of Ceph territory, excavating a specific site on an empty planet for an abandoned artifact which Homura would then attempt to study: a shard of a broken ceramic vessel, a gong, a fine chain. At first Simona assumed that Homura was too busy to do these things herself, or that she simply was too hated and too high profile of a target after New Athens, but now she thinks there was a deeper reason, as well.
"The ceph are top of mind right now," you agree. "Do you have any insight into what we're facing, here in 2011?"
"Well," she begins...
> be Simona
Your clandestine meeting with Akemi-sama is in what is clearly in the most audaciously inappropriate location you could imagine: in downtown Mitakihara, between Prometheus and Zeus. Here she sits, waiting for you, at an outdoor cafe table, under an umbrella fringed with dangling beads, sipping a cup of tea. The pedestrian traffic simply flows around, paying her no heed.
You pause a moment as you approach, half expecting someone to jump out at you and shout, "Aha!"
Your topic today is Ceph vocabulary, and she is explaining some concepts.
"The concept of a translation device is somewhat alien to them," Homura explains. "Their understanding of our languages is almost entirely a one-way matter, like imaging a planet's terrain."
"Is this because they've had a single language for so long?" you ask. "Something that co-evolved with the species?"
She shakes her head.
"The opposite, in fact," she says. "Historically the predecessors of Ceph, and indeed, all their sister races across three galaxies, were united together through mind to mind communication and sharing of emotional states. The Ceph that we know today are the successors, and the spoken language constructed less than one thousand years ago. It is an unused historical artifact, but one they will recognize."
You nod, struggling to put all the context together.
"What happened?" you ask.
"A sudden energy crisis, essentially," she relates. "The civilization all but collapsed."
Something about that seems wrong, though.
"How does a civilization like that get surprised by an energy crisis?" you ask.
"Let's not get into that," she defers.
"So this phrase means decision making authority," you say. "But literally…"
"A more literal translation is the power to speak. Language, after all, is a potent weapon, and its use is highly regulated as such. During the Reformation, the concept of speech and of authority were tied together."
You frown.
"That's something else that bothers me about this," you say. "I'm not exactly an official representative of Governance. Is speaking their language sufficient to accept me as a negotiator?" you ask. "I'd be somewhat more comfortable if you could be there."
"Unfortunately, my presence would render a peaceful outcome all but impossible," she says. "An unfortunate consequence of New Athens. But rest assured that you will be recognized without question; in fact —"
She pauses suddenly, and makes a sign for silence.
In a moment, Tomoe Mami approaches. She walks just a few steps past the table, then pauses, and looks behind her, not quite at your table, and yet …
You squirm in your seat.
Akemi-sama carefully stirs a cube of sugar into a cup of tea, and takes a sip. She then sets it back down, with a small clink of china.
Mami-san promptly shrugs it off, and continues walking.
"She's not supposed to be here," says Akemi-sama, standing up. "Excuse me."
"What happened to the Ceph parent civilization?" you want to know.
"I don't know the details," she says. "Just that they were surprised by a sudden energy crisis."
"An energy crisis, surprising a civilization in multiple galaxies?" you want to know. "And what is this Reformation? Oh, goddess, that's going on right now, isn't it? Kyuubey specifically mentioned an alien insurgency." You frown.
"They did look a little bit more rag-tag than the standard troops," admits Simona.
"I expected the technology to be older, though," you say.
"No, the dates on technology are weird," clarifies Simona. "They lost a lot of what they once had, and have only just stopped the backslide since the war with humanity."
This is not a comforting thought.
"Either way," you say. "We need to be even more careful than I'd thought. Even if we negotiated an alliance with one group, we could end up reliant on them to stop the other side from wiping out humanity. And we might have more uninvited guests coming to visit your school. Or Mitakihara. Or if we're really unlucky; they might just fly straight to the United Nations."
At least you can monitor FTL arrivals; maybe you can avoid the worst of it…
Ophelia raises a hand sheepishly.
"Why are aliens coming to Earth begin with?" asks Ophelia.
This is when it clicks.
"Energy," you explain. "Emotional energy can be used as an energy source, and something about humanity specifically may be particularly powerful. This planet, our population, could actually be the most valuable asset in the galaxy." Certainly if what Kyuubey told you is true. The aliens must have seen a very powerful signal, and just tried to fly off with its source. It would have been quite the heist, though of course, it's uncertain whether Ophelia would have been exactly what they wanted.
"Oh," says Simona.
Indeed. But look on the bright side, Clarisse. At least if the Ceph end up distracted by humanity's potential generally, they may be less interested in Simona's soul shards. You know, the ones in your handbag. Well, mostly in your handbag.
"I need to go back and confer with the others," you say. Your data uplink here is not very good, and you'd prefer this in person. Then you pause.
"Simona," you ask. "When Akemi-sama told you about all these things, you two were in downtown Mitakihara?"
"Yes?" she replies.
You have a suspicious feeling. And it is, after all, literally right in front of her place of business.
> Ask her whether Homura ever disguised herself as one "Joanne Valentin"
"I don't know who that is," she says. "I mean, I wouldn't put it past her. She can do a lot of things like that. There was one time she stole her own clone from the Prometheus Institute because she wanted to be two places at once."
"Joanne was there on the river-bank the night Ryouko made her contract," you say. "Before the demons attacked. We thought it was suspicious."
"On the river-bank…" repeats Simona, and she nods. "Of course."
Ryouko has been waiting for you.
Machina wants us to be quiet, she tells you as you arrive. By this she means radio silence.
Machina has been keeping an eye out for the interloper. She caught a very brief anomaly shortly after Nanami returned, and is working with Nanami to isolate this part of the building. Machina also thinks the interloper might be aware of being tracked, and would prefer not to tip her off that you're on to her. Since you were likely to return to the girl's room yourself, she stationed herself here to guard it, and to intercept you.
Okay, you acknowledge. I've just learned interesting things about aliens. How have you been?
This is a slightly loaded question, it seems.
Ryouko has been pondering what to do with herself. One of the students asked her what she was interested in at school, and she couldn't very well detail all the space topics, so she mentioned offhandedly that she always got high marks in civics.
The girl thought civics an excellent idea, suggesting Ryouko should run for student council, and go into politics, so that she could "throw out all the old men, and make it so that women aren't required to wear super high heels at work any more." It's a bit of a trivial suggestion, compared to more direct ways of saving the world, but something about it has left Ryouko unsettled. She really doesn't want to be President of some unimportant student council in the 2011 edition of Earth. And yet …
The girl thought of the government as changeable, Ryouko saw. That, fair or unfair, it was possible for one person to change it, and especially so with the right connections.
And now Ryouko is afraid, because she thinks something is wrong with Governance, and it's rooted in the fear of stagnation that vexed her, that drove her to her wish in the first place. And besides that, she thinks of how it cooperates with the Incubators, and how that isn't good enough either. And she is afraid to even dare to change it, and she is even more afraid to leave it alone, afraid of not daring to try for better, afraid of saying it can't be helped and moving on...
You're rather fond of Governance, so this is a bit much that hits you.
Oh, you think at her, a bit flustered —
You are suddenly interrupted by shouting from down the hallway, not too far outside.
"Aha!" says Nanami, as she flings open a door; then there is high-pitched shrieking. Ryouko, slightly annoyed that Nanami didn't think to plan this part of the assault, quickly blinks outside to the scene of action, readying her outfit and her crossbow.
The closet does not contain an invisible interloper. It does, however, contain a very startled and somewhat embarrassed Sayaka, and a somewhat startled and very embarrassed Hitomi. It appears they have been caught kissing.
Hitomi has fled down the hallway.
There are several ways this could have been handled better, notes Machina, regretfully. A few more moments to get everyone in place, for instance. We're lucky it was two of our group and not random students who we might need to explain ourselves to.
I don't even know how they got over there!!! says Nanami. She's visibly shaken, and upset.
Nanami, you tell her, it's quite understandable. Our situation is imperfect. If we had all the resources of human civilization before us, we'd have training, we'd have senior magical girls who would take point on operations, and you'd have time to learn before these things happen. You were doing the best you could without all of that. The important part is acknowledging that it was a mistake, and learning from it.
Nanami slams the door in frustration.
Sayaka, in the meantime, stands there, attempting to gain her composure.
Nanami sighs.
"I don't suppose there's anything to be said about it," she
"K-kissing practice," she mutters.
"You turned off location updates for kissing practice?" asks Nanami, incredulously.
"Y-yeah! You wouldn't? Why are you even tracking us to begin with?" asks Sayaka.
"For your own safety!" says Nanami.
"Yeah, well, no one asked you," complains Sayaka.
"Stop it," demands Ryouko, sharply, as she hears the approach of footsteps, and Ms. Valentin steadily walks down the hallway, to the group, and stops.
"Staying late on your first day, Miss Shizuki?" she asks Ryouko, and then turns to Nanami. "I trust there's a ready explanation for the disturbance here," she says.
At least there isn't much need to make up a story about it.
> invest time wisely
[][Aliens] Discuss aliens with the group!
-[] (float your proposals, concerns, contingency plans)
-[] (what would you be willing to overtly break the masquerade for?)
[][Ryouko] Encourage Ryouko to change the system from within
[][Ryouko] Encourage Ryouko to imagine radical change to Governance
[][Ryouko] Steer Ryouko's concerns towards ending Incubator perfidy and Governance's role in the exploitation of their magical power
[][Ryouko] Steer Ryouko towards building the future she hopes for outside of Governance, such as this world she's in right here
[][Ryouko] Don't dissuade Ryouko so much as remind her of how much there is to preserve that is good in Governance
[][Ryouko] Steer Ryouko towards more important or more immediate concerns (like finding Asami)
[][Ryouko] (a write in here would be lovely)
Sequence a few top priorities, write in details, and discuss any delegation that you find wise.
A few suggestions follow.
[][Evening] (your plan name here)
- [] (write in follow-ups, schemes, goals to pursue)
- [] Work on that essay about ballet
- [] Talk to Sayaka about things like boyfriends
- [] Try to watch just how Ms. Valentin deals with Yuuka's situation
- [] Consult Oriko about the future and the state of cubes
- [] Try a new tack to locate the interloper and tail Nanami's neighbor
- [] Arrange general training to improve teamwork skills
- [] Perform more research on souls
- [] Orchestrate witch hunts
- [] Hang out with Kyouko (possibly multitasking)
- [] Locate Hitomi and speak reassuring things to her
- [] Execute earlier plan in which Hitomi visits the past again
-- [] (write in directives regarding Nadeshiko, or Yukari-san, or Simona)
- [] Discuss your first day of school with Papa.
-- [] (bring up other topics?)
