Laurelin
Ain't got nothing better.
- Location
- Where the Wild Wolves Have Gone
You know damn well Sabrina would have a literal friendship cannon that could shoot meguca at Witches if she could get away with it!
Puella Magi Adfligo Systema
- Thread starter Firnagzen
- Start date
-
- Tags
- puella magi adfligo systema puella magi madoka magica be gay do crimes (gay) female protagonist bad decisions dating mami tomoe (tomoe mami) diabolical laughter friendship is the best ship handholding identity crises microwaving tea gets you put in the bad place names are important the body is the fursona of the soul this is not the baked goods thread we don't talk about rionna what could possibly go wrong? who in the world is azure sanfrancisco?
You know damn well Sabrina would have a literal friendship cannon that could shoot meguca at Witches if she could get away with it!
Hang on, does she actually?
There are some pictures at Kriemhild Gretchen - Puella Magi Wiki and none of them show feathers.
Websearch does uncover one feather-y picture (
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DB_Explorer
Purveyor of alternate realities.
- Location
- San Diego, California
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Madoka: Kyuubey, I've come to bargin!
Homura: Noooooooooo!
Kyuubey: Very well Miss Kaname let us... this is most unusual.
Madoka: [Slumps for a second as her eyes go unfocused before coming to with a diffrent stance and body language] I'm afraid incubator that this little one is *mine* so I do belive you need to shoo [flicks Kyuubey in the head making him disintegrate]
Sabrina: O. O
Madoka: [Goes back to normal] uuh guys why are you all staring at me for suggesting the arcade?
Homura: No reason! Arcade sounds fine!!
EDIT: Wait I actually confused you for DB. Somehow.
Yay im thread famous enough to be confused for other people.
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AuraTwilight
The Sorcerer of Smiles
- Location
- The Silver City
Her familiars are feathered angels. Her Witch Kiss has black-feathered wings.
- Location
- The Surface Of A Hostile Planet
Right. So, uh... what could we do against Kreimheld Gretchen, if she's Feathers? By the strictest literal reading of her witch block, the only way to defeat her is to get rid of all the suffering in the universe, and I don't think anyone here thinks that that's an achievable goal.
Maybe we can just stall her out, either through force (undefeatable doesn't mean unstoppable), or by promising her that we'll gather all the grief and misery ourselves?
AuraTwilight
The Sorcerer of Smiles
- Location
- The Silver City
Honestly the only way I can imagine defeating Kriemhild Gretchen is by promising her that Sabrina WILL EVENTUALLY save the universe. She's Once-Madoka and might actually listen.
Also this might be the ticket to keeping Kyubey from fucking us over. "If Sabrina Vee dies, a multiversal, unstoppable monster that is conceptually invincible will destroy the universe."
Also this might be the ticket to keeping Kyubey from fucking us over. "If Sabrina Vee dies, a multiversal, unstoppable monster that is conceptually invincible will destroy the universe."
DB_Explorer
Purveyor of alternate realities.
- Location
- San Diego, California
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Kyuubey: ah... so *this* is what fear feels like!
SaltyWaffles
I am dissapoint, son
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Feathers hasn't done anything in four years. Hell, the only time Feathers did anything at all was when we messed around with making our own Barrier. That's it.
Dewitching is much more pressing, especially since we've made a breakthrough, but haven't actually followed up on it yet for no goddamn reason.
DB_Explorer
Purveyor of alternate realities.
- Location
- San Diego, California
- Pronouns
- He/Him
[jk] Feed the gems ALL THE HAPPINESS over Mami getting better
: D
[jk] Then go buy them a happy meal
: D
[jk] Then go buy them a happy meal
Appletank
Acquire Cheese
Drag her to our birthday parties? Call her Mom and distract her by babbling about our day?
Onmur
Archangel of Nutella.
Make Homu put on her glasses and braids, wrap her in a ribbon, present as apeace offering to KG.
The Phoenixian
The Glacier Witch
- Location
- My own little world
If this is Gretchen or an alternate Madokami the question in my mind is, has she witched out yet?
I mean, Oriko describes the event we saw as "Similar in action, but not in form," to the feathers that block her memories.
And if Firn's comments on how the situation in Asunaro would have developed is any indication, the sooner we actively go out of our way to solve these things, the less of a giant mess it will be.
Asunaro didn't trouble us for years either.
And yet, had we shown up in the first week or two, we might have stopped Hijiri from contracting at all. Had we waited another week, we'd have been dealing with a terrorism campaign, not a robbery.
Firnagzen actively, explicitly, wants us to be proactive; to find problems when they're small and solve them before they become disasters. By the time a situation has reared up to look us in the face, that's not being proactive anymore.
And yes, Dewitching is a thing we should be doing. If we end up rigging up a grief device to make contact with Aurora just after lunch so that Homura can spot for us? That would be ideal. I have numerous ideas on how to do so.
If even moderately successful, it even allows us to present real, undeniably concrete progress to Anri for dealing with that whole mess.
But I dislike the arguments you made against looking into the feather, and I moreso dislike the underlying idea that one line of inquiry precludes the other.
-----------------------------
EDIT: I should note that my thoughts on preemption here also applies to any version of Feathers.
If Feathers is Homucifer, we figure out how to talk to her and talk her down before she goes on a rampage. If she's Dedolere we make preparations to stop ourselves and ensure our work on dewitching can be replicated by others. If it's Madoka turning into Gretchen, we figure out how to grief-cleanse a God before she falls.
And so on and so forth.
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- Location
- USA, Midworld world line
...You have inspired a vision, one where Sabrina has a meticulous and fell plan "B" to end WPN forever...
- But her plan "A" is to save Mitakihara with the force of brain damage. When the Queen of Witches apports over the city, Sabrina will be there to challenge it to... a suitably sized Tea Ceremony. Cakes and wagashi, all the trimmings.
Nova Prospekt pt. 4
You relax too, with the probably hostile military base left behind. Vladivostok dwindles behind you, and though you're not even anywhere near Japan yet, you find yourself gladder for it. You're headed home, after a trip that wasn't really all that long, but still the furthest you've been away.
"Are you feeling alright, Homura?" you ask.
Eyes of faded amethyst framed by long, black hair flicker over to you, Homura meeting your gaze for a long, thoughtful moment before she finally nods.
"I am," she says. "I've never..." She trails off and shrugs.
You raise an eyebrow at her, smiling, but she doesn't continue. After a moment of mutual staring, you arch your other eyebrow to join the first and give her a sheepish shrug. You're good at translating Homura-ese, but not that good. You need something to work with, but if Homura doesn't want to elaborate, you won't push.
That said, it's a comfortable silence. You relax back against the Grief seat, padded against the constant crush of acceleration as you arc over the ocean. You can see the Sun cresting the horizon ahead of you, and you know that somewhere over there is Mitakihara. One more quick stop to raid the Yakuza, and you'll be home free.
... come to think of it.
"Hey, Homura?" You break the silence, glancing over. "Do you know of any Yakuza bases outside of Mitakihara? We could hit those instead of inside Mitakihara, just to spread the... suspicion around, and make sure that the Yakuza in Mitakihara aren't too stirred up?"
"Sendai," Homura says. "Shouldn't be a problem."
The conversation lapses once more. You spare a fraction of attention to check the missile trucks, trailing behind you in their own sealed platforms - yep, no issues there. Homura can't stick something that large into her shield, which only makes sense, really. And it would explain why Homura had to guide Walpurgisnacht all the way over to the water so she could use that truck... which was a JSDF Type 88, if you recall correctly.
Must've stolen that from somewhere nearby.
You find yourself thinking about weapons of increasing firepower, from nukes to antimatter. You probably could produce them, but really, there's no point. If you wanted to annihilate a few square kilometers, you have a dozen, less volatile ways of doing it, so the only point would simply be for the sheer flashiness.
Not that anyone would appreciate it.
And honestly, you're not sure you can imagine a situation where you have to annihilate a few square kilometers of ground.
Instead of dwelling on that, you bum a few links of heavy steel chain off of Homura, and start practicing your enchantment instead. It would be ideal if you could figure out how to parley your control enchantments into some kind of persistent but active animation, but you'll take any kind of progress.
"I've never brought anyone with me," Homura says, stirring. "For... this."
"Hmm?" you ask, blinking and looking up from the steel you're moulding between your fingers. "Didn't you get help with transport before?"
"Teleporting to the location, yes," Homura murmurs. "I haven't... had anyone join in before."
"Ah," you say, and give her a grin. "Well, I had fun, and I'm glad you let me come along. So... thank you for bringing me, and thank you for trusting me."
"You're welcome," Homura says.
You grin at her. "What're friends for? But seriously, I appreciate spending time with you. This was fun, in and of itself, and I'm looking forward to the next time, yeah?"
Homura nods silently, and you grin. You don't really feel the urge to say much - you were considering venting earlier, but... really, you feel a lot more settled now, and Homura seems perfectly content to enjoy the silence, and so you do, returning to the enchantment.
By the time you get to Sendai, you've managed... two things.
"Hm," you say, frowning at the thing in your hand. The second thing you'd made is just a little steel crankshaft, not even much longer than your index finger if it were straightened out.
Except...
"Why is it moving?" Homura asks.
"I... well, it's magic?" You grab the shaft before it tumbles off the edge of your palm.
"Does it do anything?" Homura asks, frowning at you.
"Nope, that's it," you say, and grin. "It's progress, I think. I can... I don't know, imbue the idea of motion with an enchantment. I'll have to see whether I can do anything more with this later."
Later, because Sendai looms up ahead, an older skyline than the gleaming spires of Mitakihara City.
"But first!" you continue brightly. "I have a present for you, Homura."
The first thing you'd made with your magic is a tiny, palm-sized sculpture of Madoka, as precise as you can make it and carefully concealed from Homura as you formed it out of enchanted steel. Just in casual clothes, neither school uniform nor magical girl costume, posed as if she's looking happily at someone in front of her.
"For you, Homura," you say, beaming and passing the little sculpture to her. "As thanks for bringing me on this trip."
Homura stares at it for a long, long moment before swallowing and tucking it away in her shield, expression carefully blank.
"Thank you, Sabrina," she murmurs, and reaches out hesitantly to clasp your shoulder, the barest touch before she yanks her hand away. "I- thank you."
The smile you direct at her must be blinding.
You make your stop at Sendai, Homura guiding you towards a perfectly innocuous apartment building. You can't help but notice the Yakuza hanging about as you tread through silent corridors. Nearly all rough-looking men, some with a veneer of respectability in suits and ties, most of them with heavy tattoos.
Waving your way through stale cigarette smoke, you and Homura make your way to their storeroom, cracking through safe after safe. And this time, you grab a considerable amount more money and gold rather than destroy what you can't take.
"You should take some too," you say, shoving half the stacks of bills at Homura.
"I don't need money that much," Homura says, frowning.
"I mean, not now you don't," you say. "You might need it in the future."
Homura shrugs, and passes her shield over the stacks to make them vanish. You grin at her, and vacuum the rest up into your hammerspace. Strictly speaking, you didn't even need to open the safes to get at the money, but you do if you want Homura to take a share.
"... also," you say as you check the room one last time, sweeping a near-invisible sandstorm of Grief across it to clean up any fingerprints you might have left. "I don't suppose you saw another katana on display somewhere?"
Homura's brow knits slightly. "Not every yakuza base has a display piece."
"Aw," you say, pouting. "I was thinking about doing the mop thing again."
"The... mop thing," Homura says, tone completely and utterly flat.
"Yeah!" you say with a grin. "The mop thing! Where we replaced the katana with a mop."
"Oh," Homura says, nodding. "We can... go and look? The main office is nearby."
"Sure," you say with a grin. "I admit, I'm not actually sure I wanna do it, but it might be fun. I mean, the white rat will cover up the worst of the things that happened here. What do you think, Homura?"
Homura shrugs, and turns to lead the way out. You follow her down the corridor and into an opulently furnished room in a fully modern, mostly Western style. It's occupied by a heavyset, older man sitting at the desk, but the two of you ignore his frozen form as you look around.
"... oh, that is lovely," you murmur, spotting and walking over to one of the glass display cases. It's not the only one in the room, but this one contains a fine, medium-length curved blade.
"Uchigatana," Homura murmurs, joining you.
"Short, curved... perfect for quickdraw," you say. "What do you think, Homura?"
"It's your choice," Homura says.
You frown at it for a moment, before shaking your head. "Nah. Not this time, I think... in all seriousness, I don't really need a blade, and it might not be good to have some kind of signature linking this raid to the one in Mitakihara."
"Such as their goods vanishing from under their watch?" Homura asks drily.
You blink at her in surprise and grin. "Was that a joke?" you say, and laugh in delight. "Well, yeah! In all seriousness - mysterious vanishings are one thing. A signature is another."
Homura nods, seeming almost... shy.
"... hey, while we're on the subject of jokes," you say. "What's with that time you told Nadia your name was Akemi?"
"My name is Akemi," Homura says, tone bland and even. Too bland, you'd say.
You give her a suspicious look, and she just blinks slowly at you.
"I'm pretty sure it's some kind of in-joke," you say, pouting. "But I don't know what it is."
"Correct," Homura says, nodding.
"... correct, as in yes it's an in-joke, or correct as in I don't know what it is?" you ask. You narrow your eyes at Homura, who nods, and starts walking away. "... hey!"
You hurry to catch up, laughing as you go and smacking her lightly on the shoulder.
And from there, you head out of the building, taking once more to the skies. One more short hop back to Mitakihara. The familiar skyline has both you and Homura relaxing. Rather than head back to the school, and Mami, you head out to the old industrial district.
"There," Homura says, leaning forward extending one hand to point.
"Ah, not Warehouse-kun?" you ask, grinning.
"... no," Homura says. "As far as I know, no one owns this warehouse. It goes untouched until Walpurgisnacht."
"Gotcha," you say with a grin.
It only takes you a bit of work to squeeze all three missile trucks into the warehouse and drape them with a few large tarpaulins Homura produces from her shield. And it's a good thing you have Grief and magical girl strength to work with here, because tarpaulins big enough to cover entire trucks are heavy. You step back to inspect your handiwork, giving it all a dubious look.
"Are you sure this will be fine?" you ask Homura. They... admittedly they don't look like missile trucks, but they're still very obviously trucks with heavy cargo, in an unused warehouse. There are no obvious tyre marks or other tracks leading into the warehouse, so you suppose that if you close the door it wouldn't look like anything changed, but still.
"It's worked before," Homura says, swinging the heavy doors shut. You step smartly out of the way, snagging the chain to lock it back up.
"Alright," you say, and sweep into a florid bow. "I bow to your greater expertise."
"... let's go back," Homura says.
You smirk at her, and a few minutes later, you're airborne once more, headed back towards the little park outside the school. You land, deconstructing the Grief platform and rendering it back down to Grief before detransforming. Homura gives you a questioning look, raising a hand to her shield.
You flash her a thumbs up. The world shudders, and you can't help but shiver at the way sound and heat and noise roll back in, a discordant hubbub of life as time resumes.
Ah, magic.
Homura banishes her costume in a brilliant strobe of purple light, and you trot out from behind the hedge to rejoin your friends. You make a beeline over to Mami, and... Mami sweeps you into a hug.
"Hi!" Mami says, beaming at you.
"Feels like I haven't seen you in over a week," you tell her, smiling back. "Hi!"
"Welcome back!" Madoka says, giving both you and Homura a bright smile.
"Hey, everyone," you say cheerfully, before turning to Sayaka and giving her a serious look. "Sayaka, you haven't gotten into trouble, right? It's been over a week since I last saw you."
"... where the hell did you go, America?" Sayaka asks, squinting at you.
"Eh, nah, America would be a couple of hours," you say. "We went to Mars."
Sayaka squints harder at you, her eyes narrowing to slits. "I can't tell if you're being serious. Madoka, is she being serious?"
"Ah... I don't think so?" Madoka says.
"Right... Mami, is she being serious?" Sayaka asks.
"No, she's not," Mami says, laughing and ducking under your arm, pulling it over her shoulder. You grin at her.
"Yeah, thought so," Sayaka says, nodding solemnly. "Homura isn't stark raving mad yet."
"Sabrina's not that bad!" Mami protests, hugging you.
"You're biased," Sayaka says, propping one fist on her hip. "And everyone knows it."
Hitomi and Madoka nod in agreement. You catch a flicker of motion out of the corner of your eye and whirl just in time to catch Homura nodding.
She catches your eye and shrugs. "Biased."
Sayaka cackles as you shoot Homura a betrayed look.
"Well... that's fine, because I have Sabrina," Mami says, giving you a shy smile.
You laugh, and give her a kiss on the cheek.
"Ah, well, guess I got the better of that," you say cheerfully. You can't help the blush, dammit.
"We should start moving," Hitomi notes.
"Yep, yep," Sayaka says.
You head off towards Mitakihara Middle School, chatting with your friends. Just one more teenager in the crowd of students drifting towards another day at school, and you're not even the tallest in the crowd.
... Japan tends towards shorter people, but that's in aggregate. And every generation is taller than the last and anyway, even Kyousuke's taller than you are. Not everyone is short! Sure, the tall ones stick out, but you're not alone there.
It's all too short a walk before you arrive at the gates of Mitakihara Middle School.
"See ya, Sabrina!" Sayaka says cheerfully. She hefts her two bags -well, hers and Hitomi's- and loops her free arm around Madoka's shoulder, nudging the pinkette towards the school.
"A-ah... see you at lunch, Sabrina," Madoka says, waving as Sayaka drags her towards the school. Homura follows, giving you a nod of acknowledgement.
"Have a good morning, Sabrina," Hitomi says with a demure smile.
"See you!" you say.
And then there were two. And dozens of students walking past you towards the gates, but still. You and Mami, who purses her lips thoughtfully.
She cups your chin and pulls you down so that she can kiss you gently on the cheek, her face flaming just as red as yours.
"You owe me one kiss," she says, giving you a tentative smile. "Pay it back at lunch time?"
You blink, and then you laugh, hugging her. "I will. I promise. With interest, even!"
Mami smiles brightly at you for a moment, and then it fades.
"I'll try and remember," Mami says, meeting your eyes. "It's... easier when you're around."
"That's all I can ever ask for," you say, sobering. "And I'll always be back."
"Then for now... I'll see you at lunch?" Mami asks.
"You will!" you say.
Reluctantly, Mami disengages from the hug, taking a step back and starting to walk towards the school, head held high. She doesn't look back, though you can tell she wants to, and finally, she disappears past the doors of the building proper.
You hum quietly to yourself, waiting for a moment before trading a nod with the truancy officer -a familiar face, now- and turning to leave.
A few minutes later, you've wandered down an alleyway and bounded to the roof, spreading your wings to soar over Mitakihara. It's time to go and pay a visit to the Kures, you think.
[] Meet the Kures
- [] Vote in abeyance
-- [] What, in detail, do you want to discuss about the potentialbomb?
[] Something else?
- [] Check in on Kyouko
- [] Check in on Masami and Hiroko (and Ono)
- [] Check in on Tsuruya Yuki
- [] Check in with the Pleiades
- [] Check in with Tokyo
[] Write-in (word count limit: 150 words)
Ugh. Sorry for the late update, and despite that, for cutting it off anyway - but stuff came up over the weekend, so I didn't get much writing time. I'm aiming to update again on Thursday, but no promises there.
"Are you feeling alright, Homura?" you ask.
Eyes of faded amethyst framed by long, black hair flicker over to you, Homura meeting your gaze for a long, thoughtful moment before she finally nods.
"I am," she says. "I've never..." She trails off and shrugs.
You raise an eyebrow at her, smiling, but she doesn't continue. After a moment of mutual staring, you arch your other eyebrow to join the first and give her a sheepish shrug. You're good at translating Homura-ese, but not that good. You need something to work with, but if Homura doesn't want to elaborate, you won't push.
That said, it's a comfortable silence. You relax back against the Grief seat, padded against the constant crush of acceleration as you arc over the ocean. You can see the Sun cresting the horizon ahead of you, and you know that somewhere over there is Mitakihara. One more quick stop to raid the Yakuza, and you'll be home free.
... come to think of it.
"Hey, Homura?" You break the silence, glancing over. "Do you know of any Yakuza bases outside of Mitakihara? We could hit those instead of inside Mitakihara, just to spread the... suspicion around, and make sure that the Yakuza in Mitakihara aren't too stirred up?"
"Sendai," Homura says. "Shouldn't be a problem."
The conversation lapses once more. You spare a fraction of attention to check the missile trucks, trailing behind you in their own sealed platforms - yep, no issues there. Homura can't stick something that large into her shield, which only makes sense, really. And it would explain why Homura had to guide Walpurgisnacht all the way over to the water so she could use that truck... which was a JSDF Type 88, if you recall correctly.
Must've stolen that from somewhere nearby.
You find yourself thinking about weapons of increasing firepower, from nukes to antimatter. You probably could produce them, but really, there's no point. If you wanted to annihilate a few square kilometers, you have a dozen, less volatile ways of doing it, so the only point would simply be for the sheer flashiness.
Not that anyone would appreciate it.
And honestly, you're not sure you can imagine a situation where you have to annihilate a few square kilometers of ground.
Instead of dwelling on that, you bum a few links of heavy steel chain off of Homura, and start practicing your enchantment instead. It would be ideal if you could figure out how to parley your control enchantments into some kind of persistent but active animation, but you'll take any kind of progress.
"I've never brought anyone with me," Homura says, stirring. "For... this."
"Hmm?" you ask, blinking and looking up from the steel you're moulding between your fingers. "Didn't you get help with transport before?"
"Teleporting to the location, yes," Homura murmurs. "I haven't... had anyone join in before."
"Ah," you say, and give her a grin. "Well, I had fun, and I'm glad you let me come along. So... thank you for bringing me, and thank you for trusting me."
"You're welcome," Homura says.
You grin at her. "What're friends for? But seriously, I appreciate spending time with you. This was fun, in and of itself, and I'm looking forward to the next time, yeah?"
Homura nods silently, and you grin. You don't really feel the urge to say much - you were considering venting earlier, but... really, you feel a lot more settled now, and Homura seems perfectly content to enjoy the silence, and so you do, returning to the enchantment.
By the time you get to Sendai, you've managed... two things.
"Hm," you say, frowning at the thing in your hand. The second thing you'd made is just a little steel crankshaft, not even much longer than your index finger if it were straightened out.
Except...
"Why is it moving?" Homura asks.
"I... well, it's magic?" You grab the shaft before it tumbles off the edge of your palm.
"Does it do anything?" Homura asks, frowning at you.
"Nope, that's it," you say, and grin. "It's progress, I think. I can... I don't know, imbue the idea of motion with an enchantment. I'll have to see whether I can do anything more with this later."
Later, because Sendai looms up ahead, an older skyline than the gleaming spires of Mitakihara City.
"But first!" you continue brightly. "I have a present for you, Homura."
The first thing you'd made with your magic is a tiny, palm-sized sculpture of Madoka, as precise as you can make it and carefully concealed from Homura as you formed it out of enchanted steel. Just in casual clothes, neither school uniform nor magical girl costume, posed as if she's looking happily at someone in front of her.
"For you, Homura," you say, beaming and passing the little sculpture to her. "As thanks for bringing me on this trip."
Homura stares at it for a long, long moment before swallowing and tucking it away in her shield, expression carefully blank.
"Thank you, Sabrina," she murmurs, and reaches out hesitantly to clasp your shoulder, the barest touch before she yanks her hand away. "I- thank you."
The smile you direct at her must be blinding.
You make your stop at Sendai, Homura guiding you towards a perfectly innocuous apartment building. You can't help but notice the Yakuza hanging about as you tread through silent corridors. Nearly all rough-looking men, some with a veneer of respectability in suits and ties, most of them with heavy tattoos.
Waving your way through stale cigarette smoke, you and Homura make your way to their storeroom, cracking through safe after safe. And this time, you grab a considerable amount more money and gold rather than destroy what you can't take.
"You should take some too," you say, shoving half the stacks of bills at Homura.
"I don't need money that much," Homura says, frowning.
"I mean, not now you don't," you say. "You might need it in the future."
Homura shrugs, and passes her shield over the stacks to make them vanish. You grin at her, and vacuum the rest up into your hammerspace. Strictly speaking, you didn't even need to open the safes to get at the money, but you do if you want Homura to take a share.
"... also," you say as you check the room one last time, sweeping a near-invisible sandstorm of Grief across it to clean up any fingerprints you might have left. "I don't suppose you saw another katana on display somewhere?"
Homura's brow knits slightly. "Not every yakuza base has a display piece."
"Aw," you say, pouting. "I was thinking about doing the mop thing again."
"The... mop thing," Homura says, tone completely and utterly flat.
"Yeah!" you say with a grin. "The mop thing! Where we replaced the katana with a mop."
"Oh," Homura says, nodding. "We can... go and look? The main office is nearby."
"Sure," you say with a grin. "I admit, I'm not actually sure I wanna do it, but it might be fun. I mean, the white rat will cover up the worst of the things that happened here. What do you think, Homura?"
Homura shrugs, and turns to lead the way out. You follow her down the corridor and into an opulently furnished room in a fully modern, mostly Western style. It's occupied by a heavyset, older man sitting at the desk, but the two of you ignore his frozen form as you look around.
"... oh, that is lovely," you murmur, spotting and walking over to one of the glass display cases. It's not the only one in the room, but this one contains a fine, medium-length curved blade.
"Uchigatana," Homura murmurs, joining you.
"Short, curved... perfect for quickdraw," you say. "What do you think, Homura?"
"It's your choice," Homura says.
You frown at it for a moment, before shaking your head. "Nah. Not this time, I think... in all seriousness, I don't really need a blade, and it might not be good to have some kind of signature linking this raid to the one in Mitakihara."
"Such as their goods vanishing from under their watch?" Homura asks drily.
You blink at her in surprise and grin. "Was that a joke?" you say, and laugh in delight. "Well, yeah! In all seriousness - mysterious vanishings are one thing. A signature is another."
Homura nods, seeming almost... shy.
"... hey, while we're on the subject of jokes," you say. "What's with that time you told Nadia your name was Akemi?"
"My name is Akemi," Homura says, tone bland and even. Too bland, you'd say.
You give her a suspicious look, and she just blinks slowly at you.
"I'm pretty sure it's some kind of in-joke," you say, pouting. "But I don't know what it is."
"Correct," Homura says, nodding.
"... correct, as in yes it's an in-joke, or correct as in I don't know what it is?" you ask. You narrow your eyes at Homura, who nods, and starts walking away. "... hey!"
You hurry to catch up, laughing as you go and smacking her lightly on the shoulder.
And from there, you head out of the building, taking once more to the skies. One more short hop back to Mitakihara. The familiar skyline has both you and Homura relaxing. Rather than head back to the school, and Mami, you head out to the old industrial district.
"There," Homura says, leaning forward extending one hand to point.
"Ah, not Warehouse-kun?" you ask, grinning.
"... no," Homura says. "As far as I know, no one owns this warehouse. It goes untouched until Walpurgisnacht."
"Gotcha," you say with a grin.
It only takes you a bit of work to squeeze all three missile trucks into the warehouse and drape them with a few large tarpaulins Homura produces from her shield. And it's a good thing you have Grief and magical girl strength to work with here, because tarpaulins big enough to cover entire trucks are heavy. You step back to inspect your handiwork, giving it all a dubious look.
"Are you sure this will be fine?" you ask Homura. They... admittedly they don't look like missile trucks, but they're still very obviously trucks with heavy cargo, in an unused warehouse. There are no obvious tyre marks or other tracks leading into the warehouse, so you suppose that if you close the door it wouldn't look like anything changed, but still.
"It's worked before," Homura says, swinging the heavy doors shut. You step smartly out of the way, snagging the chain to lock it back up.
"Alright," you say, and sweep into a florid bow. "I bow to your greater expertise."
"... let's go back," Homura says.
You smirk at her, and a few minutes later, you're airborne once more, headed back towards the little park outside the school. You land, deconstructing the Grief platform and rendering it back down to Grief before detransforming. Homura gives you a questioning look, raising a hand to her shield.
You flash her a thumbs up. The world shudders, and you can't help but shiver at the way sound and heat and noise roll back in, a discordant hubbub of life as time resumes.
Ah, magic.
Homura banishes her costume in a brilliant strobe of purple light, and you trot out from behind the hedge to rejoin your friends. You make a beeline over to Mami, and... Mami sweeps you into a hug.
"Hi!" Mami says, beaming at you.
"Feels like I haven't seen you in over a week," you tell her, smiling back. "Hi!"
"Welcome back!" Madoka says, giving both you and Homura a bright smile.
"Hey, everyone," you say cheerfully, before turning to Sayaka and giving her a serious look. "Sayaka, you haven't gotten into trouble, right? It's been over a week since I last saw you."
"... where the hell did you go, America?" Sayaka asks, squinting at you.
"Eh, nah, America would be a couple of hours," you say. "We went to Mars."
Sayaka squints harder at you, her eyes narrowing to slits. "I can't tell if you're being serious. Madoka, is she being serious?"
"Ah... I don't think so?" Madoka says.
"Right... Mami, is she being serious?" Sayaka asks.
"No, she's not," Mami says, laughing and ducking under your arm, pulling it over her shoulder. You grin at her.
"Yeah, thought so," Sayaka says, nodding solemnly. "Homura isn't stark raving mad yet."
"Sabrina's not that bad!" Mami protests, hugging you.
"You're biased," Sayaka says, propping one fist on her hip. "And everyone knows it."
Hitomi and Madoka nod in agreement. You catch a flicker of motion out of the corner of your eye and whirl just in time to catch Homura nodding.
She catches your eye and shrugs. "Biased."
Sayaka cackles as you shoot Homura a betrayed look.
"Well... that's fine, because I have Sabrina," Mami says, giving you a shy smile.
You laugh, and give her a kiss on the cheek.
"Ah, well, guess I got the better of that," you say cheerfully. You can't help the blush, dammit.
"We should start moving," Hitomi notes.
"Yep, yep," Sayaka says.
You head off towards Mitakihara Middle School, chatting with your friends. Just one more teenager in the crowd of students drifting towards another day at school, and you're not even the tallest in the crowd.
... Japan tends towards shorter people, but that's in aggregate. And every generation is taller than the last and anyway, even Kyousuke's taller than you are. Not everyone is short! Sure, the tall ones stick out, but you're not alone there.
It's all too short a walk before you arrive at the gates of Mitakihara Middle School.
"See ya, Sabrina!" Sayaka says cheerfully. She hefts her two bags -well, hers and Hitomi's- and loops her free arm around Madoka's shoulder, nudging the pinkette towards the school.
"A-ah... see you at lunch, Sabrina," Madoka says, waving as Sayaka drags her towards the school. Homura follows, giving you a nod of acknowledgement.
"Have a good morning, Sabrina," Hitomi says with a demure smile.
"See you!" you say.
And then there were two. And dozens of students walking past you towards the gates, but still. You and Mami, who purses her lips thoughtfully.
She cups your chin and pulls you down so that she can kiss you gently on the cheek, her face flaming just as red as yours.
"You owe me one kiss," she says, giving you a tentative smile. "Pay it back at lunch time?"
You blink, and then you laugh, hugging her. "I will. I promise. With interest, even!"
Mami smiles brightly at you for a moment, and then it fades.
"I'll try and remember," Mami says, meeting your eyes. "It's... easier when you're around."
"That's all I can ever ask for," you say, sobering. "And I'll always be back."
"Then for now... I'll see you at lunch?" Mami asks.
"You will!" you say.
Reluctantly, Mami disengages from the hug, taking a step back and starting to walk towards the school, head held high. She doesn't look back, though you can tell she wants to, and finally, she disappears past the doors of the building proper.
You hum quietly to yourself, waiting for a moment before trading a nod with the truancy officer -a familiar face, now- and turning to leave.
A few minutes later, you've wandered down an alleyway and bounded to the roof, spreading your wings to soar over Mitakihara. It's time to go and pay a visit to the Kures, you think.
[] Meet the Kures
- [] Vote in abeyance
-- [] What, in detail, do you want to discuss about the potentialbomb?
[] Something else?
- [] Check in on Kyouko
- [] Check in on Masami and Hiroko (and Ono)
- [] Check in on Tsuruya Yuki
- [] Check in with the Pleiades
- [] Check in with Tokyo
[] Write-in (word count limit: 150 words)
[X] Meet up with the Kures.
-[X] Standing: at some point during this visit, tell Kirika about your personal revelations from last night. Not the specifics of what happened, just... where you started out, generally, what realizations you've made about Mami, and where your realizations about Mami have lead you. Ideally do this in hearing range of Oriko, otherwise just imply that Kirika had ought to pass it on.
-[X] Tell O&K they're your friends.
-[X] Thank O&K for being your friends.
--[X] Make plans to have dinner together. Mami makes the best cake.
-[X] Discuss Homura and the Potentialbomb (Privacy Sphere).
--[X] How does it affect her, in as much detail as possible?
-[X] Standing: at some point during this visit, tell Kirika about your personal revelations from last night. Not the specifics of what happened, just... where you started out, generally, what realizations you've made about Mami, and where your realizations about Mami have lead you. Ideally do this in hearing range of Oriko, otherwise just imply that Kirika had ought to pass it on.
-[X] Tell O&K they're your friends.
-[X] Thank O&K for being your friends.
--[X] Make plans to have dinner together. Mami makes the best cake.
-[X] Discuss Homura and the Potentialbomb (Privacy Sphere).
--[X] How does it affect her, in as much detail as possible?
=====
Ugh. Sorry for the late update, and despite that, for cutting it off anyway - but stuff came up over the weekend, so I didn't get much writing time. I'm aiming to update again on Thursday, but no promises there.
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AuraTwilight
The Sorcerer of Smiles
- Location
- The Silver City
"Hey Homura, we gotta to to Mars just to fuck with Sayaka."
- Location
- ⇙
Glad to see that Homura's doing better. Her reaction to the Madoka statuette was really heartwarming.
I kinda want a truancy officer interlude now. He seems like a good guy.
The Phoenixian
The Glacier Witch
- Location
- My own little world
One day, we're going to have a long chat about Sabrina's sense of time and the reactions to her oversped internal chronometer will be hilarious.
Also: Heeeeeey! Enchantment progress!
This work on incremental progress has me wondering. Light comes only a little less naturally to our grief than motion. I wonder if we can make little blinking lights.
And once we're past this stage, I wonder how much resemblance Sabrina's own personal style of Enchantment will have to coding. I mean, 1: If magic is born of emotions and thoughts then the arrangement of logic within a machine is not so dissimilar to that. And 2: We're the personification of an sci-fi loving Internet forum. Seeing enchantment as programming would just be in theme on multiple levels.
Also... cute and fun update <3, but I don't think that needs to be said.
Also: Heeeeeey! Enchantment progress!
This work on incremental progress has me wondering. Light comes only a little less naturally to our grief than motion. I wonder if we can make little blinking lights.
And once we're past this stage, I wonder how much resemblance Sabrina's own personal style of Enchantment will have to coding. I mean, 1: If magic is born of emotions and thoughts then the arrangement of logic within a machine is not so dissimilar to that. And 2: We're the personification of an sci-fi loving Internet forum. Seeing enchantment as programming would just be in theme on multiple levels.
Also... cute and fun update <3, but I don't think that needs to be said.
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- Location
- 👁👄👁
- Pronouns
- She/Her/Hers
[Q] LESSDOIT
This update made me burst into laughter. I JUST
IT WAS AWESOME
We forgot to see how Grief interacts with timestop again.
Oh well.
Oh well.
Onmur
Archangel of Nutella.
Cheeky. It would've been just a week if this was posted yesterday?
Uh... Wow, Mami's got some ridiculous interest rates.
We owe her one?
[Q] Make a chart showing every time you've kissed each other.
-[Q] Argue that you owe Mami two kisses, not one. Your OCD demands a well rounded 4 to 1 ratio.
Truancy officer is now a familiar. Oh no.
Onmur
Archangel of Nutella.
OK so, does this count as a hug from Homura? It's not technically a hug, but...
Torgamous
Aspiring Gynoid
- Pronouns
- She/Her
It counts for five hugs.
The Phoenixian
The Glacier Witch
- Location
- My own little world
From Homura?
It's reaching out and pulling us into a back breaking bearhug.