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.
[X] Go after Minako. Figure out what's wrong.
-[x] Message Kyouko and Sayaka.
You have an old burned phone from Sayaka and Kyouko; they hand one of these out to all the Magi in Mitakihara (you'd ask why, but you're pretty sure there's a magi that tracks phone calls somewhere). You quickly tap out a message with your thumb, tempered by...well...experience as a teenager in 2011.
812002903 said:
812002903: hello sayaka
812002903: minako has a powe rwe need to tlak about
812002903: i cant witcha nymore
812939962: What?
812002903: its a bigd eal
812002903: they can peramently stop us from wiching
812002903: sorry g2g
You crush the phone in your palm and promptly throw it over the edge and into the water. It'll be picked up by a trash drone pretty soon.
You take a few quick steps, then leap off of the wrecked train car. You soar through the air, arms outstretched. The purple shimmering light is already starting to fade as you soar, the moon gleaming overhead and the air brisk and cool. Autumn's ended and winter's fast approaching, and it couldn't be clearer as you reach the warehouse.
There are a few dented footsteps in the roof of the place, and a few other spots where the force of Minako's and Takane's run threatened to punch them through the building. The structure creaks under your own footfalls, and your eyes trace the cliff face nearby to try and determine where the two of them went.
Then you notice that part of a nearby chainlink fence right next to the railway tracks that lead in and out of town has been pushed out of the way, presumably in a hurry. You quickly whip a ribbon around a pole and pull yourself up a wall and over the edge.
You finally find them both next to a deathly quiet maglev track. In the dead of night, away from the city, you can finally see that the clouds are beginning to thicken. You snap your fingers and your half-cape turns into a thick, cozy scarf as you near the two of them.
There's faint rumbling as you approach, followed by a loud screech of wind as a train passes nearby, bathing the three of you in light. In the yellow of the car lights you see Minako with their hands on the side of their head and Takane's hands wrapped around their shoulders. They're staring down at their feet, muttering something inaudible as the train punches through air and blows debris around. If you weren't a magi, you might have been knocked off your feet. But right now you're barely even fazed as the air tousles your hair around.
You lean down. "Minako?"
"Fuck fuck fuck fuck."
They're overwhelmed. You can tell that right off the bat, no pun intended. You give them a squeeze around one of their shoulders. "You are alright, yes?"
"Fuck no I'm not. This is...this is a bit much yeah." They shake their head. "What the fuck, I thought this was going to be a wish to understand, not...whatever this is." They look up at you. "I'm...oh god I'm...this is a lot."
'I would believe it is.'
The three of you turn to see two pinpricks of red light in the dark, having appeared there when none of you were looking. You all stare at the creature, at the Incubator, as the air somehow turns colder. Your own eyes widen, and on instinct you pull a flintlock pistol out.
Except Minako stops you from raising your gun. Your finger pulls the trigger and your gunshot punches a fist-sized hole into concrete. You whip your head to the side. "Minako?"
They shake their head, still crouched over as they slowly stumble up to their feet. "The fuck do you want?"
'You are an anomaly,' the creature says, bluntly. 'This was theorized by Rin, based off of Mikuni's predictions, but I was truly not expecting your ability to be so...potent.' It looks directly at you. 'I must applaud your attempt to take me off of your trail, Tomoe. But this was always of interest to us.' The creature traces its eye back to Minako.
And they just stare right back. They narrow their eyes...and then open two eyes on their uniform.
A split second later, they blink twice. They visibly recoil backwards as the Incubator shakes its head.
'I could have told you that was a mistake, Miki-Sakura, but between your mothers and your own behavior, I suppose I should have expected as much. Pattern recognition is our species' strong suit.' Incubator's tail flips through the air. The creature slowly circles around, careful not to move too close. 'Your energy production is no different, but there is no accumulation. No generation of grief. No self-destruction. You will still experience pain, suffering, loss, and despair, but it is no longer of direct danger to you.'
"Are you here to gloat?" you sneer. "Show how everything is going to plan?"
'That is the thing. This is absolutely not within our plan. Humanity as a whole is a black box to us. A kind of cattle, poisoned to the touch. Your souls are so much more powerful than ours, making you far more useful, far more interesting...and far more volatile.' The creature moves closer. 'You are outside of our established framework. What is left is a...different kind of magi.
'You are Witchless.' The creature closes its eyes. 'The question is if this can spread. Or, better yet, if it should be allowed to. Our system is not immutable, nor do we keep it constant. It is up to adjustment, if necessa-'
"Your system is fucked," Minako spits. "Your system's fucked, and you're an asshole alien dipshit."
Another long pause as the creature slowly turns its gaze back to Minako. 'You really are a Miki-Sakura.'
"Yeah. I am."
You can't help but smile at them. You almost...Oh.
Oh no.
You're actually crushing on them a little.
You glance to the side and cover your face before you recover your posture and stand upright.
Incubator almost sighs, or at least it makes a performative sound to simulate exhaustion. 'This warrants further study. So if there's any indication...' It slowly turns away, trotting slowly across the tracks. 'I do hope you survive the coming war. If only because a power like this comes rarely, and it never has the effect that yours does.'
Another train passes. The area is flooded in light and sound. And in the few seconds that it passes, the Incubator vanishes, leaving the three of you alone.
You wonder what Incubator meant.
You wonder if Incubators are capable of spite.
And more than anything...
You wonder what Minako saw...
[=]
Your name is Sayaka, and you're staring at your burner phone. Mami destroyed hers; you can tell because your last few frantic messages were not received. But more importantly, you're stuck staring at the fact that your child has a wildly potent power.
Their empathy lets them permanently destroy witches.
They can erase a magi's suffering for good.
You have a war on the way. But you close your eyes and breathe in.
Right now, you and Kyouko are sitting in Oriko's room as she pours cups of tea for the two of you. She finished drinking her champagne, and her magi body means that she's only slightly tipsy as she pours water out of an electric kettle.
You glance over towards her as she pours a drink out.
"Fuck," you mutter.
Kyouko looks over your shoulder to see the message that Mami sent you. She stares for a good few seconds. And ultimately, she comes to the same verbose conclusion as you.
"Fuck," She mutters.
"Yes," Oriko says as she winds a timer. By this point, the room you're all in has finally been repaired. "That's about the response I was expecting."
Your wife squeezes the bridge of her nose. "Did your fuckin' powers tell you that."
"About Minako's powers or your reaction?"
You both answer with a resounding "Yes."
"Former, yes. Latter, no. I just needed to intuit the la-"
"Please don't be a pedant. I already have a fucking headache." Kyouko breathes in.
You, meanwhile, just slump on the couch. "Oh, this is a lot. This is a lot to process." You glance over. "This is it. This is why Rin was going so hard."
"Correct," Oriko murmurs. "We've known about this for the past two months. At least, we had a vague idea of it. And Rin planned for it before starting her incursions on Mitakihara."
"And then you basically handed yourself over to us." You lean backwards. "Bnrgh."
"Well...we have a day to plan. Should we begin evacuation in the morning?"
"Yeah. It'll take all day for the city to evac. After we're sure people are out, we can start fortifying. Planning will take place midday and we can begin plans there."
"You can evacuate the city?" Oriko blinks.
"We have our ways."
"I cast illusions and Sayaka uses her authority to actually get people out. We have people in the know that can help with evacuation, and Mitakihara has been rebuilt for quick escape this time. They learned after the disaster."
"That's right."
"Don't you think Minako would want to say goodbye to their friends, too?" You wave your hand. "I think that matters, too."
"They'll have a chance when evacuation begins. Property damage will probably be tough but we have magi that can help the rebuild process if things get that bad."
WHAT ORDER WILL YOU DO THESE IN? LIST THEM FROM 1-3
[] Have Minako meet with their friends.
[] Begin the Evacuation process.
[] War Meeting; discuss how you will defend Mitakihara.
[1] Begin the Evacuation process.
[2] War Meeting; discuss how you will defend Mitakihara.
[3] Have Minako meet with their friends.
"Well, we might as well get started." You turn to Kyouko. " Evac first thing tomorrow morning. I might be a little late to the meeting, but I'll join up once everything is underway."
"Do you think Minako'll be able to meet their friends?"
"Sometime during evac. The city just hit two million; it can be done in fifteen hours, but it'll be dicey." You quietly thank Mitakihara's infrastructure for that. "What's a bigger problem is if Walpurgisnacht awakens."
"It won't come to that," Kyouko says.
"But what if it does." It's not a question, it's a statement.
"It won't." Your wife looks you in the eyes. She's not arguing with you; you know when Kyouko is about to argue. She's pleading.
"...Alright." You take in a deep breath. "Evacuation will begin at 0430 tomorrow. I'll send in the request tonight." You take a look outside.
The city is beautiful at night. Even scarred and battered and bruised, even with the Monument at the center, with twisting turns and wires and roads and railways, it's beautiful.
You want it to stay that way.
You're going to keep it that way.
[=]
True to your word, you start evacuation protocol at four in the morning. You almost want to make a joke about the time and the level of evacuation, but you're beyond that; the precinct believes you when you let your officers know it's time to leave.
Well...it takes a little bit of convincing. Specifically, it takes you arriving in fullplate armor.
With your apparent reputation for...strangeness, it doesn't take much more for people to take the message. Word quickly spreads through Mitakihara's administration, up and through the few magi that are installed in the system, and evacuation begins with the wail of a storm alarm.
The streets are quickly filled with confused and terrified civilians early in the morning as trains are packed with bags and human beings. It's a surprisingly quiet process, more murmuring and quiet fears than outright panic.
What's more unsettling is the cry of an alarm from your clock as you and your wife sit in your apartment. Your arms are wrapped around her waist, her head resting against your chest.
In your left hand, you hold your phone. You sent a text message out, but you know it's not going to lead to all that much. Just a brief little note to an old...friend? Colleague?
Acquaintance is more like it.
"Toxic bitch," you mutter.
"She's gotten better." Kyouko rolls her head up. "It's been years, Saya."
"Yes. It has been years. She also had years to get better when she wrecked Madoka's life." You take a brief look at your phone. "Don't think she'll even come."
"I know." She wriggles against you. "But that doesn't stop me from thinking about then. D'you think Mina would like it if they found out I farmed familiars? I want to keep shoving it off to the fact that this is all fucked up and I was in a bad spot and my dad's a crazy fuckhead but I still just..."
You stroke her hair. "That's because it's true, Kyouko."
"I know it's true. But it don't feel like it. I'm just...thinking. You know." She stares out to the city again.
You clutch her head close as she runs her hand across your forearm. The skies outside are a deathly grey. It's already beginning to snow; even this early into October there's snow fluttering down from the sky.
You wonder if it's an omen.
[=]
In another part of the world, a woman with short black hair rises from her friend's bed. The bedsheets fall off of her naked body as she brings a pair of glasses to her face with one hand and a bottle of whiskey with the other.
A hand stops her from bringing it to her lips.
"Not this early, Homu," Madoka whispers. "Save it for later."
"Fine." Homura puts the bottle down as she inches up the bed. "Where's Haruka?"
"In the bathroom." Madoka points across the bedsheets, to a bathroom with steam wafting out from under the gap in the door. "Did you get a text?"
Homura raises her phone to her face. "It's...ah. Miki-Sakura."
"Don't delete it." Madoka rolls her shoulders. "The last time I got a call from them was...three weeks ago? Two? I lost track." She glances.
"Was it before or after we slept together?"
"I don't remember."
"What good is that?"
Madoka shrugs.
Homura, for her part, just puts her glasses on. The skies outside are deathly grey, and even down in this part of Japan the air is getting cooler. Madoka's gigantic house is beginning to feel a little lonely, even with two extra bodies in it.
She glances at the phone. "...ah."
"What is it?"
"I'm deleting it."
"Homura."
"I'm deleting it. I do not want to deal with it."
Homura flicks her thumb across the screen before Madoka quickly pulls the phone out of her hands. The shorter woman quickly rolls off of the bed, pink hair flying around her face as she quickly sits upright at the edge and speedreads the message.
A second. Then two. Then she glances back. "Homura..."
"I'm not a charity worker."
"Homura, this isn't a charity case."
"It's also not my problem." She crosses her arms. "I refuse. I'm not going back to that godforsaken city."
"Are you sure?"
Homura clenches her teeth. "We both know what I was like back there."
"Was that the city or was it y-"
"It was me."
"Then what's the..." Madoka stops herself. "...no. No that's a stupid question. We both know what the problem is."
"I spent three decades there. One of those decades was in the same month." Homura slowly turns. "We both know what I was like back then."
"Yes. I know." Madoka glances up at her. "Do you think you're still the same Homura I broke up with?"
Homura stops moving. She takes a breath. "...I don't know."
[=]
Mitakihara is nearly two-thirds evacuated, and your name is Kyouko Miki-Sakura. The entire team is here, from every adult you and your wife have kept alive to the magi that stumbled into the city expecting a fight and instead finding an ally.
And then there's you, your wife, and a projector casting on a silver screen of blades and chain, really a phone strapped to a spear impaled in the ground.
Your wife paces in front of you as the entire group stares.
They've been split into five groups, based on their own abilities:
Defend Team is headed by Sayaka, based on her healing and protective abilities. Everyone here is meant to protect Mitakihara at all costs.
Artillery Team is headed by Akane, based around long-distance bombardment. They are also prepared to drop high-impact magi from a distance.
Strike Team is headed by Kyouko, focused on sudden and hard strikes. They are meant to disrupt charges and disappear to strike again.
This is mission control. Yuki heads the rest of the groups and keeps all teams informed at all times with multiple people in multiple parts of the city. They are based around plan reconfiguration and information control.
This is the Flank Team, meant to split the attention of a main attacking force. Strike team disrupts charges, flank team disrupts the entire battle.
Ah Punch-Wizard, the natural leader of the Long Range team.
When they're talking about droping high impact Meguca, is that like shooting them out of a cannon to where they're needed? Because that feels like a strike force duty.
Depends a lot on how the enemy teleporter functions. If they're not able to teleport over en-masse then its a choke point that either needs to be forced through or Rin's forces need to be on boats, which is probably our artillery forces perfect target.
When they're talking about droping high impact Meguca, is that like shooting them out of a cannon to where they're needed? Because that feels like a strike force duty.
Depends a lot on how the enemy teleporter functions. If they're not able to teleport over en-masse then its a choke point that either needs to be forced through or Rin's forces need to be on boats, which is probably our artillery forces perfect target.
If we expect to hold the bridge as a choke point we should reassign Flank Team to be a subordinate scouting asset of Info Team to ensure they haven't pulled a fast one and somehow gone around. Because you can't really do much flanking and harassing on a bridge in any case.
We should also be hesitant about committing the bulk of Strike in the event of a breakthrough at the bridgehead point for a similar reason.
Alright so Kasamino is north of Mitakihara, and the (maglev) railway is the red lines. Mitakihara is slightly larger than Kasamino, and there is a five-kilometer bay separating the two.
Near the center, slightly north of the major downtown area of Mitakihara, is the Walpurgisnacht seed, very close to Minako's school and the Miki-Sakura apartment.
There are some rails that are not on this particular map (trams, monorails and old rail lines are not included) but these are the places that handle a lot of Mitakihara's food production. They're also currently being used to ferry people out of the city.
If we expect to hold the bridge as a choke point we should reassign Flank Team to be a subordinate scouting asset of Info Team to ensure they haven't pulled a fast one and somehow gone around. Because you can't really do much flanking and harassing on a bridge in any case.
We should also be hesitant about committing the bulk of Strike in the event of a breakthrough at the bridgehead point for a similar reason.
Oh you don't hold a choke-point for the whole of a fight, we'd defend it until the witch seeds/meguca that Rin is teleporting in or around us make it untenable and then we fall back and blow it up so Rin can't cross anyway.
Huh, will the railways be operating heading into the city during an evacuation? Trains retrieving the last evacuees? Or automated trains that we'll want to make sure to manually shut down?
Huh, will the railways be operating heading into the city during an evacuation? Trains retrieving the last evacuees? Or automated trains that we'll want to make sure to manually shut down?
