To make people actually remember, here's it once for posterity: Minako is nonbinary and uses they/them. This message will be pinned so you people stop getting it wrong and pissing me off. If you get it wrong in the future I'm going to be much less nice, considering you have to scroll past it just to read the quest.
Well, Mami certainly seems to have picked up a few new tricks. She appears to have gone in the Bloodborne direction as opposed to Sayaka's Dark Souls path, but I'm digging her aesthetic. On that note, @TheOneMoiderah, I've got to give you kudos for the use of art in this Quest. It does wonders for setting the mood, but more than that it's just really good and always a treat to see. So thanks for putting in the effort. I really appreciate it.
The shards of glass turn to dust as Mami's cannonshot echoes through the labyrinth. It starts as a flash of bright-white light and then fizzles out to a rolling cloud of smoke and ash and gunpowder as the splintered shot peppers the entire labyrinth. Bits of magical lead hit the top, hit the sides, hit the back and continue blanketing the area long after Mami pulled the string.
Finally, she grabs the stock of the cannon and pulls. The entire weapon collapses into ribbons as the stock shrinks and transforms back into a double-barreled shotgun. The ribbon wraps itself back around her arm, turning to a dull grey leather.
The barrier's still up, which means the witch isn't quite dead yet. "So that means..."
She hears a clanging. Her head whips to the side. There's another clanging, then a gunshot, and then finally a girl goes flying over her head and into the wall behind her. Mami glances quickly at the girl. "Hibiki?"
The girl on the ground blinks twice. She's missing her right arm and a chunk of her torso, and her left eye is bleeding profusely. She chokes out a messy, bloody cough. "H-hey M-miss T-Tomoe."
Mami stares at the poor girl, then quickly whips out her ribbon and wraps it around her torso and arm.
Hibiki shakes her head. "Y-you know that doesn't actually-"
"Do anything, yes. I know," Mami flicks her flintlock out and it stretches into a repeating rifle. She puts the blunderbuss on her waist with a quick tie of a ribbon. "But do you feel better?"
The girl lays her gun (Mami notes that it is a hand-cranked gatling gun) onto the ground. "...I do, yes."
"Then it's doing its job," she says. "We can get you to a healer magi soon." She raises her gun. "I couldn't hear you while you were descending."
Hibiki shakes her head, but it hurts for her to even do that. "I-I don't know what it is? I thought you could hear me; my gun's not quiet."
"Might be the witch?" Mami checks the chamber, even though she knows it's loaded. It keeps her mind at ease, makes her feel more ready.
"I-I dunno."
Mami keeps her weapon trained. Her feet slide across the ground, careful, steady. She takes a look down.
She gets her answer.
[X] Decapitate it. (DIFFICULTY 1)
You bring six spears up, but the witch moves its hand just far enough up that you miss the head entirely and slam into the ashen snow at high speed. The impact craters the ground, raising a cloud of debris and knocking the wind from your lungs. You bounce back into the air, your breastplate slightly crumpled as the witch sends one of its remaining hands right towards you.
Big mistake. You're still holding onto four of your spears. You jam them all into the palm of the witch, the blades hooking into the bones of the palm. The witch tries to close its hand, but the spears are enough to keep it open. You twist one and the hand begins to split.
The witch screeches in agonizing pain, the hand scrambling, fingers clawing at you in an attempt to just grab you and grip you and rip you to shreds. You can feel hate radiating from it, and centipedes begin to crawl out from where you've impaled the hand and attempt to clamber up your armor.
You wisely segment the spears. The chains split off from the hand and you do a quick cartwheel across the snow. The spears twist into each other before magic turns them all into a single spear, one with a gigantic blade and six smaller chains.
And then you wrench the hand off of the body. It's a messy break, and it's uneven; two of the fingers are still attached to the arm of the witch. The creature squeals and screams in pain and anger, spewing yet more centipedes everywhere. The witch rears its head back, ready to strike you down.
Then something grabs it before it can slam its sun into you. Five bony fingers wrap around its head, clutching it tight enough to cause the sun to bulge. The heat is enough to scorch and char bone. The witch struggles against the hand, a purple copy of one of its own arms, in a desperate attempt to pull itself free.
You realize immediately who did this. "Minako?!"
The hand rips the witch backwards, and it can't even resist the force as it's pulled off of its legs and onto its back. The collar bursts into flames as the witch's head balloons again and turns a bright blue, so bright that the snow around it begins to turn to steam and the fur collar around its neck bursts into flames and sprinkles away as ash.
And behind it, with the witch's gigantic arm sticking out of the edge of their bat, is Minako. "Mama, holy fuck!"
[=]
Mami immediately fires at her feet as a freight train's worth of mass bursts out of the glass below and spreads its myriad arms. A butterfly of wrought iron and stained glass spreads its wings.
The wind forces the glass behind it to fly backwards as the creature's tongue whips over its head. It's a solid proboscis of metal, but it flexes like nothing as a single sharp glass spike rockets out of its mouth.
Mami catches the weapon with her musket and wrenches it to the side in an attempt to break it, but the tongue instead wiggles and shakes and pulls itself out of the barrel.
The force pulls her off-balance as the witch whips its head to the side to expose an eye of honeycombed glass. But of course, Mami isn't one to waste an opportunity. She grips the musket by the barrel, pulls the blunderbuss off of her hip, and fires at the compound eye.
The shots rip into it, cracking the green iris and causing the eye to explode. The witch buzzes, gigantic wings flapping in an attempt to get away from this new threat as Mami throws a ribbon right into it. It gets airborne, but not without a hostile passenger.
[=]
You watch as Minako whips the bat over their head, the hand rearing itself up for another punch. The hit slaps the witch silly as the sun grows bigger and bigger on its head, the screaming growing louder. By this point, the heat is so intense that it scorches the centipedes on the ground, smoking them to ash and threatening to make your kid burst into flames.
You take your oversized spear and split it apart once again. Ten spears, all by your side, explode outwards as you link them all together.
"Mina!" you shout over the din.
"What?! What's the plan?!"
You smirk. "I'LL GARROTE THE WITCH. CRUSH ITS FUCKING HEART!"
You see your child freeze, then grip the bat tighter. "Al-right!"
[=]
The witch carries Mami into the sky. The ribbon swings wildly, bouncing across glass surfaces and metal sculptures as she flies higher and higher and higher.
The witch spins wildly, wings folded inwards in an attempt to rip Mami off, but what happens instead is that she is brought into a spin underneath the witch and sent spiraling upwards.
Perfect.
Mami lets go of the ribbon during the upward swing, reloads her musket, takes the ribbon off of her left arm, and spins it in front of her weapon. The barrel balloons, expanding to the size of a truck as the butterfly shakes its head, clearly disoriented. It turns its remaining eye towards Mami.
And it's then that it realizes what's coming.
[=]
Your chain wraps itself across what's left of the witch's collar. It's loose for all of a second, then you rip the chains downwards and dig your sabatons into the ground. The witch struggles against you, the sun turning bright as it bends over your head.
Minako pulls the arm behind them, the bat swinging wildly as the arm of bone pulls back. The back of the hand thuds into the ground behind them, then they pull it right forwards. The chains overhead grow slack as the witch is sent backwards by the force.
And that's how you know they've got a grip on this fucker's heart.
[=]
Mami hisses as she raises the gun, one hand on the trigger, the other around the stock. She shouts her attack once more, because she has to make an impression on the young Hibki.
Not everyone should be as jaded as she.
"Tiro! Finale!"
Then the cannon fires, and the Witch of Glass is no more.
[=]
Your child's pseudo-witch hand gets tighter and tighter around the heart, and with each grasp, the sun overhead gets brighter and brighter.
"WITCH SUMMON!" your child screams into the barrier. "DEATH GRIP!"
Then the hand closes, and the Witch of Agony is no more.
[=]
Mami hits the ground hard as the barrier vanishes. Her feet slam into asphalt hard enough to crack the ground into shards as she pushes the cannon aside and lets it dissolve. Her uniform vanishes, her hands flexing as she rushes to Hibiki's side.
"Are you okay?" she asks. "I can ask Lady Rin for assist-"
"I know somebody." She coughs. "I already sent her a message." She smiles. "Oh...oh you were so, so cool!"
Mami blushes a little. "I was showboating, to be completely honest. Have to make a good impression for my audience."
"Your audience? There's only...oh, oh!" Hibiki nods despite her injuries and the fact that she only has one working eye. "Uhh...thank you, but you already made an impression on me."
"How is that, then?" Mami asks.
"Because I think you're pretty."
Mami blinks twice. Then she rolls her hand behind her head. "Oh, thank you." She smiles. It's thin and weak, if only because she doesn't quite now how to process this compliment.
"Oh, and we were going to go for tea in a couple of days, yes?"
"Perhaps we were." Mami says. "Though...we could just go for some later. No time to waste, I believe." Not to mention that in two days she has a job to do for Lady Rin.
The girl nods. Just overhead, a healing magi leaps down. And despite herself, Mami can't help but think of the tea that she was going to drink with this new girl.
[=]
You collapse, and your armor dissolves before you even hit the ground. You huff and puff and sigh. "Fuck me. That was Skadi."
"Holy shit!" Mina cackles. "I can't believe I can do that! Shit, can I summon it again?!" They whip their bat out, once, then twice, then a third. They stare at the tip of their bat. "...wait, really? That's fucking lame."
"Well, think 'bout what it took to get you the damn summon." You prop yourself up. "You passed out. Shit, at least it gives us an idea of how that power works." You raise a leg and whip it down. The momentum carries you to your feet as you take a look at your kid, who's still in their magi outfit.
"Oh, oh, but I didn't know I could do that with a witch! It's...wait..." Their eyes flicker across the ground as they process the information, then they turn to you. "...do you think it's because witches are ex-magi?"
"Oh I can guarantee it's because of that. They still operate off of the same rules of magi, just unrestrained and inhuman 'cause that's what they shed when that happens."
"Mmm. Right." Mina shakes their head. "Right. Shit. So I...basically took a piece of the witch's soul and hit the it with it."
You shrug. "Probably."
They wince. "You've been a magi too long, mama."
You snicker. "That's definitely true." You shake your head. "But...there's also one thing to note. That witch? I fought that one before."
"Wait, what?" Minako blinks. "Do witches just rehatch?"
"Well it wasn't exactly like that, but it's kinda hard to forget that witch..." You still remember the sight. Sayaka on the ground, stomped into paste. Most of her body is a mangled mess of metal and flesh, a little bit of cape here and there as her head lies severed from the rest of her body.
You remember flying into a rage, trying to kill something that you knew you weren't prepared for because you already lost your family before and you couldn't lose them again not again not a-fucking-g-
You shake your head. Your hand balled into a fist without you noticing. "No. They don't. Not unless you pump them with grief before feeding them to the creature. But I distinctly remember feeding that fucking thing the grief seed. I really, really enjoyed seeing that grief seed get fucking crunched to pieces."
"Do you think they can bring back the dead?" Minako turns across the bay.
You grimace. "Fuck me, I hope not."
[=]
Your name is Sayaka, and you're on the bridge in a bright blue t-shirt, a blazer, a pair of slacks, and some sturdy black shoes that look close enough to oxfords but are actually comfy. You're the classy mom to Kyouko's cool mom; it's a look that you honestly love a lot. Contrasting your wife is kind of a lot of fun to do with fashion.
But right now, you're not thinking that much about fashion; you're thinking about the bullshit you're hearing. "So, wait, you're saying that they can teleport grief seeds?"
Yuki nods as he leans against the pillar. "Yeah, I can't believe it either. They don't even need to plant it."
"So that's why there's been so many new witches in the past few weeks. And that means their apology was horseshit. Because of course it was." You shake your head. "That kind of makes me wonder if Yuuko's plant last week was a ploy. Like if it was meant to make it look like they were playing nice and apologizing."
He shrugs at you. "Haven't the foggiest. Maybe it was a fuckup, or their magi aren't exactly precisely planning stuff."
"I mean, it could just be a mistake." You both turn to see Erika behind Yuki. "Their structure is still more like a large organization than a hivemind."
"I think it's easier to believe it's a fuckup, yeah." Yuki shrugs.
You sigh. "I hope it's a fuckup. That'd make them easier to deal with than a hivemind."
[] Send Yuki and the team back in. (DIFFICULTY 2 - They're becoming easier to recognize)
[] Call a meeting with Lady Rin to discuss the grief seeds. (DIFFICULTY 3 - There is no guarantee that she'll play nice)
[] You know enough. Call a meeting for an offensive ASAP.
Mami stares at the poor girl, then quickly whips out her ribbon and wraps it around her torso and arm.
Hibiki shakes her head. "Y-you know that doesn't actually-"
"Do anything, yes. I know," Mami flicks her flintlock out and it stretches into a repeating rifle. She puts the blunderbuss on her waist with a quick tie of a ribbon. "But do you feel better?"
The girl lays her gun (Mami notes that it is a hand-cranked gatling gun) onto the ground. "...I do, yes."
The hand rips the witch backwards, and it can't even resist the force as it's pulled off of its legs and onto its back. The collar bursts into flames as the witch's head balloons again and turns a bright blue, so bright that the snow around it begins to turn to steam and the fur collar around its neck bursts into flames and sprinkles away as ash.
Mami hisses as she raises the gun, one hand on the trigger, the other around the stock. She shouts her attack once more, because she has to make an impression on the young Hibki.
when a particular witch sticks in your mind, the magic and grief that forms them tends to linger. it's an emotional scar, one that sticks around in your head and stays there, beating. eventually, if you remember it enough, you do know the name.
This is especially bad if, say, the witch you knew was particularly close to you. Remembering a witch's name isn't a guarantee, because whether or not you remember a witch is deeply subjective; it depends on you, it depends on the witch, it depends on the circumstances in which you met the witch.
In Kyouko's case, it's hard to forget the witch that almost killed her wife. And Homura had the name stick around over the course of about five years thanks to time loops.
I don't say that this Witch is Skadi. Because this Witch is obviously a Njord, you can see it in its gait and striking centipedes poring out of all of its orifices
I was asking how Kyouko even knew the Name "Skadi", since no Magi has demonstrated the ability to read Witch Runes in this 'verse, which Moiderah conclusively answered for me
I don't say that this Witch is Skadi. Because this Witch is obviously a Njord, you can see it in its gait and striking centipedes poring out of all of its orifices
I was asking how Kyouko even knew the Name "Skadi", since no Magi has demonstrated the ability to read Witch Runes in this 'verse, which Moiderah conclusively answered for me
It has been some time since I read the original SA, but I'm pretty sure Skadi was made of solid bone rather than metal. It's size made it metallic my durable though. But I could be wrong. Maybe Skadi was metal and I just forgot because I did not participate in that quest.
I should be sleeping though, so I'll just let you chew on your thoughts for a while.
It has been some time since I read the original SA, but I'm pretty sure Skadi was made of solid bone rather than metal. It's size made it metallic my durable though. But I could be wrong. Maybe Skadi was metal and I just forgot because I did not participate in that quest.
I should be sleeping though, so I'll just let you chew on your thoughts for a while.
Look, when I say "metal" in this context, what I mean is "impossibly awesome and probably deserving to be accompanied by an epic heavy metal orchestra" and not "consisting of any of various opaque, fusible, ductile, and typically lustrous substances that are good conductors of electricity and heat, form cations by loss of electrons, and yield basic oxides and hydroxides".
Look, when I say "metal" in this context, what I mean is "impossibly awesome and probably deserving to be accompanied by an epic heavy metal orchestra" and not "consisting of any of various opaque, fusible, ductile, and typically lustrous substances that are good conductors of electricity and heat, form cations by loss of electrons, and yield basic oxides and hydroxides".
[X] You know enough. Call a meeting for an offensive ASAP.
I'm... very uncertain about our path. But of course the news about Skadi will be the last piece we might have gathered more definitively. All that'd be left is figuring out that 'bringing back the dead' includes Magi pre-Witch, and perhaps that Mami is one of them.
...of course, there could be things we don't know, so.
[X] You know enough. Call a meeting for an offensive ASAP.
Or well, I think we don't actually know enough - I'll think that until we have exact blueprints of everything going on in Rin's little circle of semi-disguised cruelty, but the risk involved in these scouting missions has grown past their knowable value.
[X] You know enough. Call a meeting for an offensive ASAP.
You clap your hands. "So they're a hostile group, they've been hostile since before we talked to 'em, and we know they're trying to undermine us, wear us down." You grimace. "Low cost, low risk."
"But you need to be lucky every time," Yuki says.
"And they only need to be lucky once. Yes, I'm familiar with the phrase." You glance back. "Where's that from?"
He shrugs. "Dunno. Just heard it and it felt appropriate."
"Hrm. Well, still. I think I can set up an urgent meeting tomorrow. My week off ends tonight."
He grimaces. "You can't just skip another day?"
"Nah, I already got my time off. I don't want to pull that particular thread any more than I have to. I'm in good standing with the force, but that was still the longest I've ever taken off outside of holidays."
Yuki gives you another look. He looks mildly annoyed; less at you, more at the circumstances. "I guess that makes sense, yeah."
"Apologies."
"No, it's fine, Sayaka."
"That and we're gonna need to set aside time to get the attack team ready." You turn back to Kasamino at the other side of the bridge. "If we make it look like a parlay, we could just cut the head off this snake ASAP."
Yuki follows your gaze. "Do you think she'd buy it?"
"No. But it's worth a try."
[=]
Mami sits with her cup of tea in her apartment. It's still bare save for a dresser, a mirror, a bed, and a nightstand, but Lady Rin promised her that she would help furnish the place over the course of next week. And if not...well...Mami would be fine.
Lady Rin is busy. She has a city to run; Mami believed it would be unreasonable to ask Rin for such personalized work immediately. So she had already resigned herself to the fact that Rin was probably not going to furnish it next week. She shakes her head.
Across from her sits the now-healed Hibiki with a cup of tea in her hand and a light huff. She sips the tea, and with a quiet sigh, she looks to Mami. "Uh...do you...uh...have-"
"Sugar? Honey?"
"Honey, yes."
Mami stands up, walks over to the pantry in the apartment. The kitchen is the busiest part; it has the most stuff on the countertops. Pots, pans, all cleaned and meticulously placed in the shelves overhead. The pantry, however, is a different story; similarly bare save for a breadbasket, some basic children's cereal (she always did enjoy Trix), and what she was looking for: an unopened jar of honey.
She pops it open with a twist and brings it over to the tablet with a spoon in the top.
"Yes, thank you." Hibiki drips some honey into her cup. Not too much, not too little. She lightly stirs the cup, a little careless as she keeps it on the saucer. She blows on it, one hand on the back, the other around the handle, as she brings it sloooowly up to her lips.
And all the while Mami stares.
Hibiki's eyes flicker towards Mami, then at her tea. She swallows. "Uhh..."
"Oh, apologies." Mami shakes her head. "I just find that you can determine a lot about someone from how they drink their tea."
Hibiki blinks. Then she feels a little sheepish. "I...was it bad?"
Mami's eyes grow wide before she lets out a light, airy laugh. "Oh, oh no, nothing of the sort." She waves her hand. "There is nothing wrong with drinking tea in any way you choose. There's no competition. It's just that some people drink theirs differently." Mami raises her cup. "For example..."
Her forefinger and thumb keep hold of the handle, the base of the cup laying on the saucer. She doesn't blow on the tea; rather, she instead brings it right to her lips, careful to keep her back straight as she does so. She sips quietly, quickly, and cleanly before she sets it back down.
"I drink my tea in a very formal way. Kind of like how my grandmother did back in the United Kingdom."
"Oh, you're part English?" Hibiki lights up.
Mami laughs. "Oh, just a smidge. But it isn't as though that actually affects your formality. I just knew because grandmother was posh. Then she passed and, well, she had already passed her way of drinking onto me. The way I drink suggests that heritage, suggests that kind of high-class way of living. I did live in a penthouse before I was transported to this world."
Hibiki nods. "Oooh...that's right, Lady Rin said you were from the past."
"Pulled into a world where I had died a long time ago." Mami nods. "Oh, would you like me to tell you what your drinking suggests?"
"Uhhh...yeah!" Hibiki nods.
"The way you drink says that you're used to hot cocoa. You blow on the hot drink instinctively to cool it down, leaning forward to cradle the drink. The way you drink is like you're trying to cradle it, find warmth around the aroma. Similarly, you drink it with honey, because you like something sweet. Which about fits your personality." Mami smiles.
The girl beams before she sips her drink. "Oooh! But...wait, Miss Tomoe?"
"Hmm?"
"What does the way you drink say about you?"
Mami waves her hand. "It says that I'm posh-"
Hibiki shakes her head. "Not like that."
"...You wish for a more introspective answer?"
Hibiki looks to the side, then she nods.
Mami sighs, looks out the window. "Perhaps it says that I wish for order. Some kind of reason in a world that seems devoid of it. I want there to be something reasonable, something that makes sense. Something that's easy to decipher. And perhaps I'm looking not for companionship in the cup; a cup of tea is just a cup of tea. There is warmth, but it's simply energy. There's strength, but it's just the leaves, giving flavor to the cup.
"I drink Irish tea, which has a deeper flavor. I used to drink Earl Grey, but I have slowly drifted to Irish. Perhaps that's because it is more bitter, or perhaps it was a misguided attempt at growing up. I know not which."
Hibiki whistles. "That's...that's kinda deep."
"I try." Mami smiles. "Though what of you? What do you think of your drink?"
Hibiki stares at her cup, before she blows on it again. "Maybe it's because I wanna stay young?"
"Perhaps that's because you should," Mami says. "Adulthood is scary."
"But you're not there yet."
Mami winces at that. "Perhaps this is as close as we're going to get."
That leaves them on a pause for a time, both of them staring at the balcony through the window. Finally, Mami sets her tea and saucer onto the table. She pulls open the balcony door and a breeze bursts into the room before finally settling.
She sits back down in her seat as Hibiki looks between her and the cup. "Mami...do you have a girlfriend?"
Mami sputters. "W-where's that coming from?!"
Hibiki looks surprised at Mami's reaction, before she shrugs. "I just wondered if you had a partner or not. Just asking, because you seem like you'd have one."
"Oh, I wouldn't have a girlfriend, no." Mami shakes her head. "There's nothing of the sort. That would be strange."
Hibiki tilts her head. "Is...I didn't think it was strange? What was the world like in 2011 anyway?"
"It's nothing, Hibiki." Mami just shakes her head. "There was...oh my word that was so out of the blue."
"Was it out of the blue because I asked about you dating or..." Hibiki pauses. "Oh, yes, I was asking if you were seeing anyone because I still think you're pretty-"
"Oh, no!" Mami shakes her head. "Oh, no, I am not interested, not that there is anything wrong with it! I just do not think of it that way. How would two girls date." Mami laughs, and it's hollow and awkward and forced.
"They...do all the time?" Hibiki tilts her head. "Same-sex marriage has been legal in Japan for eleven years, twenty in Mitakihara."
"Eleven-" Mami blinks twice. "Twenty! I thought that was..." Mami pinches the bridge of her nose. "No, I am...right. Fine. The future is wildly different!"
When Mami looks to Hibiki, the other girl just looks off to the corner. She looks like she wants to be anywhere else. And Mami feels like the worst person alive.
"I may not be interested now," Mami says. "But perhaps you can ask later?" She shakes her head. "I am just...you know, there is a lot going on, and Lady Rin wishes to send me on a mission two days from now."
Hibiki glances to the side. "I mean...alright." She doesn't seem like she has that much interest in it anymore. "I should go."
Mami swallows. "Thank you for meeting with me."
"Right." Hibiki opens the door and promptly leaves. It takes a few seconds for the door to finally close.
Mami realizes that she hadn't finished her tea. It's just her, a table, two chairs, a bed, and two unfinished cups of tea in an empty room. The wind outside howls, and she can hear the faint sound of car horns from below.
She closes the balcony door.
[=]
Your name is Minako, and you are currently watching a movie with your girlfriend in a dark theater. The movie's kind of bland and forgettable, and by this point you've already forgotten what you saw it for. But more importantly you're leaning on her shoulder, stuffing popcorn in your face and sipping soda out of a big cup with a straw and you're feeling pretty alright.
Takane, for her part, has her hand in yours, and she brings her free hand up to the popcorn bowl and pops a kernel or two into her mouth. There's an explosion, a screaming person, a bigger explosion. A car probably flipped over.
Instead you nuzzle yourself against her shoulder. 'Hey,' you whisper.
'Mina?' She leans back towards you.
'Are you paying attention to the movie?'
She snorts. 'Not really, no.'
You laugh, and then someone in the row behind you hisses a shush in your general direction. You glance back. "Sorryyyyy," you whisper, then you turn back to Takane and lean against her again.
[] Stay in the theater.
or
[] Leave; you're not really having fun watching the movie anyway.
