Under the Open Sky (CWMGQ Spinoff)

[kelllogo]

Other than the recent pestering from a lieutenant with ideas you're treated much the same after joining the Counter Force. The odd face greets you by Summit, but otherwise stays engaged in the bustle of a growing military base.

You had the idea of seeing if anyone wanted to spar, but squelched that idea when you spotted soldiers wearing that new armor practicing. Last time had been conclusive enough for your taste. Instead you circle around until you reach the motor pool.

The motor pool is busier than the rest of the base. People are moving dollies with parts to tents set up around a lifting Brandcraft plate. Two truck-mounted cranes are putting down framework for a more durable warehouse, which has been put to use while still under construction.

A bit of asking around in the warehouse brings you to the person with your order..

"I've already sent a couple of guys to pick up what you wanted." Logan, as he introduced himself, Sergeant Carson by his nametag. "We are all more that a little confused by what a Magical Girl would do with this junk."

He gestures at the approaching pallet truck with the supplies you requested.

[X] Gryazev-Shipunov GSh-6-23. Leftover from a Unification Crusade era crash landing, damaged from the landing. Was dropped on Firebase Momo during its rapid construction. (Adds Danmaku to Shop for 175xp.) "That thing is dented enough that it would shake itself apart if you tried firing it. And we don't even have any ammo for it to use. Is fixing useless things your hobby?"

(+35 EXP from Discovery if absorbed.)

[X] Parts from the Mark 2 Frost Dragon-Class Powered Armor test version. Pilot version, has ligament hookups, neck piece of wonder-alloy, and chainmail. (Adds Thick Armor to Fuse Ability list. Adds Practitioner (Brandcraft) to shop for 140xp) "This thing pulverized the test dummy. And, if I may clarify, I'm talking about the one that was wearing this suit. If I were you I wouldn't be the dummy wearing this, even if it wasn't missing almost all the armor parts."

(+50 EXP from Discovery if absorbed.)

[X] A pallet full of various damaged or depleted tools and medical devices. (Adds Manufacture to Fuse Ability list. Adds Self-Repair to Shop for 70xp.) "If it weren't for the enchantments that need removing this stuff would already be in a landfill somewhere. Make sure to bring it back for proper disposal if you can't get it to do what you want."

(+85 EXP from Discovery if absorbed.)

"It appears you have some misconceptions about how I intend to use this stuff." you reply. Lifting your hand you chant:

"From the peaks I watch! I am Magical Girl Summit!"

Orange and green light streams over everything. Your sight widens to fully watch everything around you while your outfit changes in a wave of orange light to become your Magical Girl costume. A stray thought passes, when did the labcoat become ragged? When you first became a Magical Girl the labcoat was always pristine when you transformed. No matter.

"When I want to fully understand something I do this." the Panoply stretches out and grabs hold of the pallet. With a decisive action you bring it in front of yourself and will that it becomes part of you. Magic responses to your will and fills the vessel, dissolving it into orange motes of light. The possibilities become realized within your newly-expanded Panoply.

"Wow, that's…. Where did it go?" Logan asked in a murmur.

__/BREAK\__

A short while later you're looking over your Datamine. Listening Point Cavalier seems to be have been placed as far as possible from any other destination. Lieutenant Baker wasn't exaggerating when he described it as "middle of nowhere".

An interruption approaches in the form of one of the bases Angels. He was moving towards you at a steady rate, once he was about eight meters away he stopped, looking at your back. You wait a few seconds before turning to face him.

"Is there some…" you trail off as the Angel dismisses his wings and steps aside. Commander Mason had been walking behind the Angel.

"Summit."

"...Commander?"

A brightly shining soul.​

Decorum. What was the right stance to show respect? You straighten, move your hands behind your back, and pull the Panoply into a glossy shape.

"I'm not so flush with Magical Girls that I want to send you away for an indiscretion. Stay on base, you will be assigned missions shortly."

Weren't you already on a mission? A bit of panic worms through you, did he know?

"It's actually some sort of intelligence thing. Since Marax probably has a grudge watching who keeps track of where I'm sent could be useful." your skin crawls when you speak that thing's name, but you don't let it reach your voice.

Commander Mason gives you a skeptical look.

You press on. "I can get back here if you need me. My teleportation lets me get to places I've been quickly, and…" you trail off when Mason holds up his hand.

"Alright, you can run into North Dakota in violation of all sense. As long as you can promise me something."

"What is that Commander."

"That you will get here in less than thirty minutes if I call you back."

Contemplating over the distance you've experienced against how far the map shows the listening post to be feels easily within that limit.

You nod. "That's not a problem."

"Good. Until I say otherwise make sure that all your missions are cleared with me. Ask explicitly. Things are going to start moving a lot faster soon, I need to know where everyone is and what they are doing." Mason looks away from you and repeats himself softly. "Things need to start moving faster." he waves you away and walks off, his Angel companion following right behind.



-Summit is flying to Listening Post Cavalier-

+20 EXP Swore an oath to defend Humanity
+0 EXP Joined Counter Force
+5 EXP Impressed some onlookers
+ [$DISCOVERY_EXP_VALUE] Absorbed something interesting

755+ EXP Available.

[X] EXP Spending Plan?
-[X] Write-in

 

[kelllogo]

Under the Open Sky #2

It had been far too long since you last went flying. The horizon rushes away from you as your attitude goes ever higher, until you reach the clouds. Arresting your ascension you hang in the clouds for a few seconds before gravity takes hold.

On a whim you dismiss your transformation once the view of the ground clears.

You instantly regret it. Icy wind screams in you ears and forces your eyes shut. Tumbling and cut off from the world, you can't even hear yourself when you invoke your transformation.

The world returns to its prior state. Your magic touches the reality of this dimension and grants you the certainty that you can move by your own will. Dark edges of vision retract to let you see all around you. And a field interposes itself between you and the harsh wind.

Something was different. You remain in freefall as you try to work out what's changed. There's something itching, a sensation of static that you can almost hear. Abruptly it comes into focus.

"...glowing orange streamers around something it dropped."

"...even try to deny it. Just skipped town before anyone found out it was him. That's not how an honest man acts..."

"...Blowing in from the east. That means the next few days will feel balmy compared to the…"

The phantom sounds overlap and drown each other out, a mental effort damps them. The last bit you had been able to make sense of sounded like a weather forecast. Radio, you had somehow become able to directly hear radio without needing to express it from your Panoply.

You guess that could be useful? Perhaps you would be hiding somewhere and what to here the dispatcher without letting the noise give away your location. It would be more helpful if there was a way to broadcast as well. The thought is interrupted by an approaching problem.

A few tugs on the composition of space flings you away from the ground before you impact it. Rotors and jets roar as you reshape your Panoply around yourself to facilitate flight. A quick expression and check of a GPS has you well on your way to your destination.

With that dealt with you can resume examining the radio power you suddenly developed. A bit of effort has the channels flowing past one by one. You find a conversation that sounds interesting to try broadcasting.

"...Pants on. There are lots of weird things that happen, until and unless it causes damage we aren't going to call in support.

"It's going somewhere, this is a straight line with the last four reports. And it's new behavior. Tell me, when does an obviously magic flyer get attention?"

"Can you give me coordinates of the last sightings? Depending on where it's going I might be able to flag it."

One of the voices gives coordinates, going by your GPS whatever they're talking about is right by you. And may have been following you.

"This is Magical Girl Summit. I'm just west of those last coordinates, but I haven't seen anything. How are you detecting these contacts."

"Summit, how did you get this frequency?"

Frequency? The radio you're speaking over feels more like… a bit less than a hundred meters?

"Don't be so hard on her Jimmy. Could you fly north at best speed miss? I have a hunch."

"Really? The answer just drops in your lap again? Where do you get your luck Jesús, I could use some of it."

Turning to your left brings your bearing to magnetic north. The frequency is quiet for almost a minute before Jesús pipes up.

"Got it! It's a quick and dirty contact, but it shows you moving north at the same speed as the others. Mystery solved."

"I need to get you to pick out lottery numbers for me one day. It's like you've got blackmail on the very concept of luck."

"I can get things sorted on my end miss. Don't worry about flying unless you're going near an airport or base. No one wants to pick on Magical Girls. And most of you don't want to be hit by planes so it all works out. We'll just make a note of some of the characteristics of your contacts for the benefit of the next person you confuse."

"This, of course, assumes you are a brave defender of love and justice. If you are otherwise inclined you may find the skies of Earth much less friendly once we notice."

You give a quick thanks and resume flying towards your original destination.

__/--\__

By the time you reach Cavalier Listening Post you've figured out how to 'tune' your new sense into FM radio, 'speaking' FM was messy and tended to just overwhelm nearly every broadcast when you tried. It was also so distorted that it could hardly be understood.

The base is dominated by a beacon of light rising from the satellite-tracking radar. After the Unification Crusade it had been used as a 'intention' component to guide and anchor a scrying spell. Looking at it you can tell that the radar still works and the beam of light that rises from it is a strand of Discovery magic that extends more than a hundred kilometers into the sky. You imagine the view would have been breathtaking if it weren't blocked by a layer of clouds.

Near the radar the original buildings have mostly collapsed, the Counter Force decided to replace them with magic support structures instead of trying to restore them, and a base much like Firebase Momo is perched nearby. The pre-fab buildings are reinforced with dirt piled on the sides, and two guard towers are placed kitty-corner to look over the surroundings. Snow has been cleared away to reveal gravel paths between the listening post, the radar, and the road to the north.

You land a short distance away, slamming into the snow with a muted thud, retract the Panoply to float behind you, and make your way into the post. As enjoyable as flying miles above the ground could be you were looking forward to getting some food after flying for hours. Perhaps they have new flavors of ice cream?

"Unidentified girl in the labcoat with the funky black thing floating behind her! Hold and wait for someone to escort you!"

Huh. Shouldn't they know who you are? You turn to the speaker and introduce yourself.

"I am Magical Girl Summit. I was directed to come here."

The man in the tower repeated his command to stay put.

Electing to follow his instructions you stand in the cold for almost ten minutes before a pair of fully-armored soldiers arrive as escorts. You are led to an office-pattern building, and once inside to the office of Major Barbara Gordon, a greying lady with sharp eyes.

"I looked into the Magical Girl Summit who was assigned to arrive out of the blue." Gordon leans forward in her chair. "Turns out when they unified the records from Canada they awarded Summit the Ebony Butterfly. Tell me why that's relevant."

You've heard that term before… a few days ago you received a notice that you had been stripped of the Ebony Butterfly decoration. You'd never bothered to find out what that meant.

"I don't have that decoration anymore. There was something about not qualifying for it last I remember." you reply evenly.

Gordon gave a short bark of laughter. "You certainly don't qualify. It's a post-mortem award for Magical Girls. Summit is dead and has been for at least four years. Why are you impersonating her?" her tone dropped. "Why are you here?"

"I was never dead. I escaped from a cage Marax had used to trap me. That was only two months ago, I formally joined the Counter Force earlier today." you offer.

"People don't come back from the dead. Summit is dead, and I will not allow an imposter on my base. Even if, by some miracle, you are telling the truth, Magical Girls draw trouble that I don't want." Gordon pushed herself upright, a joint popping as she did so. "You can fly right back to wherever you came from. If you stay I'll call in someone who can drag you off. I'd have you locked in a room if it wasn't counterproductive to the goal of getting you as far away as possible. Do you understand?"

You really didn't, everything should have been set in order.

She doesn't care.​

Nothing to do but muddle through it. Gordon's threat to have you hauled off would just end with her being presented proof of your survival.

"If you re-assign me I'll leave the next morning. I'd like to get some rest and food before flying back." you say.

Gordon scowls are you.

__/--\__

The major lost interest in yelling at you surprisingly quickly. After asserting that you would be locked up and have metal rods driven into your head she seemed to lose steam. You've had a soldier named Corey Hill assigned to escort you until the Major finds a way to force you from the base.

Corey had whisked you out of Gordon's office almost before the sound had died from being told to escort you. Since he said that he was taking you to the canteen when asked you have no problem with the quick exit.

A few minutes later you've mixed boiling water with various powders to make mashed potatoes, gravy, and hot chocolate. Detransforming to better fit within the small area, you take a seat at the solitary table. Corey pipes up as you start eating.

"Are you always this quiet? It's kind of chilling that you just kept staring at the Major back there."

You give a quick nod and eat another spoonful of your sub-par instant potatoes.

Corey rubbed the back of his head and kept quiet for a half-minute. "Where are you from anyway? It must be close by if you got from there to here in one day."

You take a sip of hot chocolate before replying. "I think it was New York? I didn't pay that much attention to where exactly, I used GPS to get here."

"Wha-! That's more than a thousand miles away.... How fast do you fly?" Corey said, a befuddled expression apparent on his face.

"Not quite that fast. I teleported to Chicago as a shortcut, about halfway. I might end up teleporting here as a shortcut if something in the future needs me further west." you offer.

"That's..." he waved his hands in the air for a bit, "that's almost as ridiculous as your outfit."

You direct attention to said outfit.

It adjusts to the wearer, in magic and in form.​

When you had put it on earlier it was light grey, now it was orange with black tiger stripes. Fashion warred with Modesty over whether this was a good thing. At the very least it was no reason to stop spending as much time transformed as you could manage.

Enough time thinking about the uniform, you had food left to eat. A few more minutes suffices to finish it and to wash the dishes you used.

Now, what to do with your remaining time here?

Schedule [One from each time division]:


[X] Night
-[X] Get some sleep
-[X] Call your supervisor in Firebase Momo before Major Gordon goes too far
-[X] Patrol the area
-[X] Sneak into the abandoned buildings and try Fusing the equipment inside
-[X] Abandon your mission by teleporting back to Firebase Momo, Commander Mason seems to want you there at least
-[X] Watch cat videos instead of sleeping

[X] Morning
-[X] Sleep in
-[X] Patrol the area
-[X] Try being social
-[X] There's an Earth Practitioner on the post, try to meet them
-[X] Meditate next to the beacon
-[X] Watch cat videos instead of something productive

[X] Afternoon
-[X] Patrol the area
-[X] Try being social
-[X] There's an Earth Practitioner on the post, try to meet them
-[X] Show off by blasting snow banks with your power
-[X] I'll stop watching cat videos when you pry the tablet from my steel manipulators!


+2 EXP Summit is bad at skydiving
+10 EXP Made air traffic a bit less mysterious
+0 EXP Rule the airways
+10 EXP Reached Cavalier Listening Post
+15 EXP Discovery resonates with you...
+2 EXP Stubbornness wins the day


669 EXP Available.

[X] EXP Spending Plan?
-[X] Write-in

 

[kelllogo]

After getting something to eat your thoughts turn back to the threats the Major had made. While you doubt that she could cause serious trouble for you, having a witch hunt focused on you yet again is unappealing. You aren't sure what Gordon was going to try, making this as good a time as any to take your supervisor up on her offer to help out.

You pace a bit in the canteen thinking. Corey slouches against the wall.

No helping it, to make a call you need to transform. Your uniform didn't come with pockets. The Panoply had a phone absorbed within it, but you were already worn out from having the energies of Magical Girl Summit empower you.

At your call magic suffuses through you, your vision expands outwards, power settles over you. And your phone is extruded by the Panoply.

Corey keeps leaning on the wall through all this, his only concession to the lightshow is raising his hand to shield his eyes.

It's the work of a moment to dial back to Firebase Momo. The wonders of modern magic carrying the signal across. Something to do with magnetic-electric sympathy given a helping hand by magic and a big network, you ponder while the call connects.

"This is Jessica Hewett. What's tonight's crisis?" your call had been answered.

"Ah." there's about three things you want to say at once. "This is Magical Girl Summit. I'm-"

"Oh, hi Summit! Usually I get calls about MGs instead of from. Since you're calling me I'm sure everything going to work out." Jessica interrupted.

"...ok."

"Sorry, I just wanted to make sure you didn't get the wrong impression from when I picked up the phone. Go ahead."

"I, I mean-there's an issue that…." how to put it? "Major Gordon doubts that I actually am Summit. I want to make sure that this doesn't lead to another round of vetting, it's gotten old." you say.

"Lemmie check real quick." Jessica hums for a few seconds then continues. "I see five separate verifications, there's nothing to worry about on your end. Any challenge is just going to be rejected, the examiners are at least as tired of this as you are."

"Thank you." you offer. That's one less thing to worry about.

"I'll send you a few things to sign with your Data Mine. Once you've finished that some records will be more visible. Will save everyone some time if the Gordon fellow talks to the wrong people. Feel free to call if you have any questions about them, as long as you wait until tomorrow because I'm planning to fall asleep after that. Goodbye." Jessica finished.

Drat. You would like to get some sleep soon. It didn't matter what the clock said, right now you were feeling very worn out. You curse your lack of pockets and that you Fused your Data Mine.

__/--\__

Forty minutes later you've received and looked over the eight forms that had been sent to you. Jessica had somehow sent them with most of the information pre-filled, which you appreciated, but you still had to enter your title and pin via the touchpad eight times.

Now you were finished. You basked in the sense of elation that filing forms could give you, practically nothing, and dismissed the magic that was supporting you.

Your feet touch the ground, your vision narrows and darkens, and fatigue spikes. For a moment you lose track of where you limbs are and flail to try and keep your balance. You are righted by someone grabbing your shoulder from behind.

"You look beat." offers Corey. He had stepped over to keep you from falling over.

You give a nod as you place your feet more firmly on the ground.

You follow as he leads you out of the current structure, through the cold, and into the building where the bunks are placed. He points you at a room near the center and says he'll be right back.

Opening the door shows that the room already has some odds and ends suggesting that someone was occupying it. There was a colorful poster on the wall and a few metal sculptures on a desk. Someone must have offered you their room, you briefly wonder if this means they're sleeping on the floor.

You take the opportunity to lie down on the bed with your feet dangling on the floor for the while waiting for your minder to return. After a brief wait he returns with something tucked under his arm. When he tosses it at you you jolt upright and knock the thrown shirt out of the air.

"There you go. I thought you wouldn't want to sleep in that outfit, so I grabbed one of Mark's t-shirts. He's a bit of a MGroupie, so if you want to thank him you could just sign the shirt or something. Anything else I can do for you?"

The shirt in question is a white shirt with the words Green Day and a design in green, nothing threatening. A moment of pondering the room gives an answer to his question.

"Could you get a couple more pillows?" you ask.

"Is something wrong with this one?"

"…I like burying myself in pillows when I'm sleeping." you admit.

"I'll see if I can find a few spares for you."

In the end you only get one more pillow. You situate yourself so that it covers you and drift into sleep.

----
"Are you going to introduce yourself?" asked the younger of the two women who you were trying to pass.

So much for trying to let her pass. You would just as soon not involve yourself with any of the Epic or Divinity level Magical Girls that also arrived at this base. Being impolite to someone with Hope, Magic, and Epic would be worse.

"I am Magical Girl Summit. My affinities are Discovery, Protection, and Implacable." you reply, following the format you had heard before.

"You don't-. Wait, that's not a growth affinity…." Her confused response is cut off by her companion leaning closer to you.

"You poor thing. You've met with a terrible fate, haven't you?" she locks her eyes with yours as she speaks.

You had thought she was unextraordinary, but there's something in her eyes -- something heavy.

"I-"

Creation. Magic. Hope. Water.

"What are you!" you break eye contact and look at the sky.

Sky. Lightning. Wind.

There's too much. You can see it all around you through the eyes of your Panoply.

Fire. Earth. Horror.

You cover all the eyes, but you're still looking at her...

WORLD.

--whowhatwherewhenwhy--

"Say 'unfamiliar ceiling'." Says a voice from in front of you.

"What?" For some reason you had covered all the eyes of your Panoply, along with your own.

When you uncover them and examine your surroundings you see that you are on a path next to a building. Standing in front of you is a blond Magical Girl, (Hope, Magic, Epic.) and a beautiful but mundane women. The latter of which is pointedly looking away from you.

"I'm sorry, but I'm not sure what you mean." you clarify.

"Don't worry about it." the older Magical Girl waves her hands into an open gesture. She then waves the other to follow her and disappears around the corner.
----

"Anna!"

Your mother shouts at you from where she sits in the hotel room. You stop entering through the door with a small jump of shock.

"When you went to meet the local Magical Girls what did you promise me?"

"Oh, you said that I had to stay out of trouble." you reply.

She stands up and crosses her arms, glaring at you.

"Did I forget something?" you ask, shrinking back from your annoyed mother.

"Close the door and we'll talk." she says, stressing the final word.

You hang your head and maneuver the door shut.

"You were on the news. I was watching when you almost got killed. If that thing had hit any harder it would have crushed you when you were hiding under that truck." Mom says quickly, an undercurrent of stress making her voice slightly unsteady.

Oh. That's right, while you were mostly visiting the movies and the zoo with Magical Girl North Star and Magical Girl Tiger's Eye, there was that shapeshifting monster you spotted. You try to explain how you identified the thing with the Horror magic and that the other girls charged in, but you are interrupted.

"Anna. You promised to stay out of trouble, instead you ended up almost being killed on the afternoon news! That thing was… it almost cut the car in half. How do you barely remember!"

"I wasn't going to get killed. The monster didn't expect me to roll under the truck. North Star killed it after that. It only took a couple minutes. We did a lot more stuff later, like see Sky Writers, and the polar bear, and got ice cream-" you trail off under your mother's disbelieving stare.

"The monster thing was pretty quick. I saw a seagull that had Horror magic and when I pointed it out the monster grew into that ogre-thing and tried to hit me. I could tell that it didn't think I would roll under the car so I did that and shot it in the ankle. North Star burned it right after that. Then we went to the movies." you explain.

"You really don't see why something trying to smash you is worrying?" your Mom asks quietly.
----

With a flash of orange your bracelet turns into a telescope. You hold it to your eye and sweep it across the horizon, doing a quick check for anything that has a hint of magic.

"See anything?" your mother asks from the driver's seat of the Humvee.

You shake your head in response. She gives a quick nod and turns to talk to guy riding in back, who is making a few marks on his map. You softly murmur the word leftenant to yourself, still funny-sounding.

"Where to next, sir?" she asks.

"Go another 5 kilometers west. We need to backtrack around the lake to get there." he holds the map so your mother can see it. "We've ruled out the outer portions already, so we need your daughter to be sharp for the next bit. It's right where the helicopter's last known position."

"Why does he always talk to you instead of me?" you groan.

"Anna, please don't be rude to my boss." she says in a tense tone.

You respond by leaning your face against the window and collapsing the telescope with a snap.

"I wouldn't want to try ordering around a teenage girl." quips the passenger.

"I'm not a teenager." you say softly, "I am Magical Girl Summit." it makes you feel a bit better.

Space.

Above you, almost where you can't see from the short windows.

"Magic! Above us!" you shout. Hand going for the door so you can take a closer look.

A moment later you've opened the door and worked your way free of the seatbelt to look straight up. There's a patch of sky that looks normal and feels strange, it's laced with Space magic.

Your mother says something, you don't hear it as the patch of magic is suddenly all around you. Acting on a sudden urge you push yourself away from the humvee as the world goes crazy. Darkness snaps over everything and your stomach gives a lurch from falling. You shift the telescope into a vacuum cleaner and push your power into it to slow your descent.

It works. The airflow pulls it up enough for you to hang from it as you drift down. It doesn't stop a sinking feeling as you realize that there's nothing that would have stopped the humvee from falling. You're screaming before you reach the ground.
----

You flex your right hand. Everything moves smoothly, no pain or locking up.

"It feels normal." you inform the doctor looking your hand over.

"You realize that this is a miracle even for magic healing. Avoid doing whatever left your hand in that shape again." he says.

"It was starting to heal on it's own." you offer.

When you pushed on the bit of discontinuity to unleash it you had caused major damage to your hand. At the time you hadn't given it a through inspection because it had done the intended thing of shattering the prison item you were trapped inside. You had just incased your hand within the Panoply and gone about Fusing the pieces of the prison item and looking for a way back to Earth. You were pretty sure the injury was more extensive back then.

"That was it starting to rot I'd wager. Next up, you're not thin. You're emaciated. You'll be taking some anti-nausea drugs and four meals a day until you've added ten kilograms, that's still below a healthy weight but that's when we'll start some therapy to make you stronger." he continues.

You nod. It would be nice to be able to move around when you aren't in your magical girl state. Right now you mostly crawl when the power leaves you.
----

"We aren't going to attack?" you ask your companions.

The larger of the pair, an angel nearly twice your height, keeps flying his circuit. It's the Magical Girl that answers while standing on thin air.

"No. Counter Force is going to drop Carnage on them. No reason for us to rush in and make things more confusing." Magical Girl White Quill explains.

You look north over the lower bay of New York. With your vision you can tell that beings of chaos are moving through that city. Even across the distance it almost feels like you can hear the screams of people.

"Are we going to do nothing?" you ask.

"Merely being here keeps your home safer." answers the angel in a deep voice before he flies further away from you.

"The three of us can't stop an entire army." White Quill waves her hand to indicate the angel and you. "We stay here, keep watch, and attack them if they come to us. That keeps Hell from being able to split their forces every which way. And helps keep the battlefield tidy for when the tanks get there."

You don't have an answer to that. You hover in mid-air for a few minutes before White Quill speaks again.

"Um, if you want to leap into the fray so much you should ask to join the Counter Force. They'll send you away from home, but you won't end up standing guard so much. They like recruiting flying Magical Girls, so you're unlikely to be turned down." White Quill says.
----

"Serve me, or perish."

A crushing force on your chest.

A claw on your face.

Pain from your cheek being sliced.

You cough on your own blood.
----

"Whoa, easy!"

You let out a hacking cough. Your heart beats like it's trying to jump out of your chest. Cold air flows over your face and legs.

Taking stock of your surroundings you see the room you fell asleep in. Your minder, Corey. is standing back near the door. Someone you don't recognize is backing away from you, hand on his leg. You must have kicked him during that last dream, which is still making you feel a bit unsteady, and that knocked the covers loose and made the shirt you were wearing….

You clutch the nearest blanket to cover yourself. "Get out! Get out! Get-"

"Summit! There's a couple of Magical Girls who just waltzed on base. The Major wants you to scare them off." Corey interrupts, looking at an upper corner of the room.

You squeeze your eyes shut and take a few steady deep breaths. Couldn't the emergencies wait until after you had something to eat? Or a few moments to think?

"I'll be ready, just turn around or something please." you say.

"We'll leave to grab our stuff. Everyone's glad we have a friendly Magical Girl here now." the one you don't recognize says as he and Corey leave, closing the door behind them.

Once they've left you stand up, yank the shirt over your head and toss it on the bed, and grab your uniform to tuck under your arm as you activate your transformation. Streams of orange light play over everything in the room as the power transforms you. Vision spreads from the narrow field of your eyes to encompass all around you. And the cold draft becomes much less noticeable with your greater durability.

Wherever these intruding Magical Girls were you could easily find them. With a pull on reality you shift yourself two hundred meters in the air to discover them.

Below you a girl with green hair and a skimpy outfit (Life, Love, Story) is pushing up against a man twice her size, and pushing him back at her walking pace. Behind them an obvious Magical Girl flies on undersized wings (Song, Wind, Story), her dark hair and dress flowing in it's own breeze. You have a hunch that there's something else that shares an Affinity with the flying girl staying close to her.

The flying girl is holding a violin-like item to her hip and letting a bow hang loosely in her other hand. The one with green hair doesn't have any obvious weapons. Neither one appears to have noticed you.

Counting the fellow being pushed around there are five people keeping track of the pair of Magical Girls. One pair is looking around the corner of a building with large rifles to hand and the other pair is one soldier with a smaller weapon and a dark-skinned woman with a stone staff (Earth) crouched behind a vehicle. It looks like one of the towers has the sentries moving the larger fixed weapon so that it could be trained on the interior of the base.

[X] Plan?

Suggested Possibilities (May or may not be horrible ideas):
Drop out of the sky in front of them and demand they leave.
Use Machine Talk to find out what's going on before doing anything else.
Use Ramming Speed to send one of the MGs flying before they look up.
Teleport next to one of them and grab them.
Set everything on fire.
Fly off and abandon the base to its fate.

State of Forces:
Magical Girl Summit: Active
Corey Feingold (Crack): Incoming (3 turns)
Milt Georges (Technician): Incoming (3 turns)
Jools Basil (Crack): Active
Stoo Newguard (Crack): Active
Henriette York (Practitioner): Active
Jops Wednesday (Technician): Active
Greg Ice (Technician): Being pushed around
Mark Miller and Mack Keller (Tower Crew): Moving a crew-served weapon (6 turns)

Magical Girl Waton Green: Escalating
Magical Girl Heartstrings: Nervous

+25 EXP Weird Dreams
+1 EXP Gaia Flashback

26 EXP Gained = 140 EXP Total

[X] EXP Plan?
[X] Save it?

Anyone have recommendations for formating the dream section? I meant to put a few more in there because of the sleep in vote, but I feel like it got away from me.

 

[kelllogo]

Hanging in the air you realize that you have a distressing lack of instinct for the present situation. Should you charge from the sky? Or would it be better to join one of the groups? A part of you wants to duck behind cover until you've seen what they can do. Another part goes in circles trying to think of what you could say to them.

As you hover you watch the scene unfold beneath you. The girl with green hair drives the soldier near her behind a parked semi truck, blocking one group that was tracking them but still letting the Practitioner have a clear view. The flying girl glances up when following and makes a gesture upwards, you can't make out what she says.

It appears that you no longer have the advantage of surprise.

The pair of girls say something back and forth. They're interrupted by an earth-shaking noise as the Earth Practitioner slams her staff into the ground, making a 2-meter high wall rise out of the earth next to her. The one with green hair grabs the nearby soldier by the throat.

You think you've waited long enough. With an unreal tug you stand right next to them and extend your magic in a novel way by brushing your hand into the back of the unfortunate soldier.

"Guardian Touch!"

A green glow settles over him, brighter lines connecting from his neck to his arms emerging as the effect settles. The green-haired girl startles at your arrival.

"Wha-." she makes a jerking motion, shaking the man she was holding violently by his neck. Then tossed him, by the neck still, over the truck. "Heartstrings! Why didn't you tell me she could teleport?" a thud comes from the other side of the truck while she's talking.

(Bare-handed Attack: 750 Base Damage, +88 Dice, -375 No Weapon, +100 Gravity = 553 Damage
Greg: 75 Base Resilience, +680 Guardian Touch, No Dice, -175 Wrung by the neck = 580 Damage Reduction

Attack Negated

Greg: 2075 Health)

"I did!" insisted the flying girl, Heartstrings, with a musical quality to her voice. "Didn't you watch that video?"

"I thought it was just-." the green haired girl takes a breath. "We're trying to keep you from making a mistake." while she's talking she circles to the side until your head isn't looking at Heartstrings.

"Why did you attack him? What mistake?" you ask.

Magical Girl Heartstrings is shaking slightly, bow held to her instrument. Something comes over the radio while the green haired girl responds.

"We've identified the one with green hair as Wanton Green-"

"They talk about defending mankind, but they're just the same as the assholes who have always sent people to die for their power."

"-She regenerates quickly and has attacked the Counter Force before."

"There was a chance for mankind to be free of them,-"

"Six days ago she feigned surrender then killed 31 people. No info yet on her companion. Engage with caution"

"-But cowards and fools choose to be safe instead of free. Now Magical Girls like you who should be keeping people free think you're helping by supporting the rulers. Join me in tearing down the tyrants, when they are dead the dark forces won't have a reason to attack." she finishes earnestly.

There is only one answer that comes to mind for her proposal, "No."

Wanton Green scowls. "You're still valuable dead. Heartstrings! K-" you interrupt her with a quick punch that sends her flying.

To your right Heartstrings runs her bow across a single string, producing a power chord. The wind surrounding her becomes empowered by the sound and rushes at you.

(Panoply:1040 Base Damage, +117 Dice, +10 Talk to the Hand: 1167 Total Damage
Magical Girl Wanton Green: 350 Resilience, +32 Dice, +50 Teching, -50 Didn't see it Coming = 352 Damage Reduction

815 Total Damage

Magical Girl Wanton Green: 3500-815 = 2685 Health

Magical Girl Heartstrings casts Know Your Enemy!
Roll 157 + 350 = 507

Wind Servant attack x11

Slam: 30 Base Damage, No Dice, +507 Know Your Enemy, +100 Storied Power = 637 Total Damage
Magical Girl Summit: 680 Base Resilience, +10 Dice, +95 Reactive Field, -100 Hostile Story Effect = 685 Damage Reduction
Attack Negated

Slam: 30 Base Damage, No Dice, +507 Know Your Enemy, +100 Storied Power = 637 Total Damage
Magical Girl Summit: 680 Base Resilience, +140 Dice, +95 Reactive Field, -100 Hostile Story Effect = 815 Damage Reduction
Attack Negated

Slam: 30 Base Damage, No Dice, +507 Know Your Enemy, +100 Storied Power = 637 Total Damage
Magical Girl Summit: 680 Base Resilience, +117 Dice, +95 Reactive Field, -100 Hostile Story Effect = 792 Damage Reduction
Attack Negated

Slam: 30 Base Damage, No Dice, +507 Know Your Enemy, +100 Storied Power = 637 Total Damage
Magical Girl Summit: 680 Base Resilience, +77 Dice, +95 Reactive Field, -100 Hostile Story Effect = 752 Damage Reduction
Attack Negated

Slam: 30 Base Damage, No Dice, +507 Know Your Enemy, +100 Storied Power = 637 Total Damage
Magical Girl Summit: 680 Base Resilience, +176 Dice, +95 Reactive Field, -100 Hostile Story Effect = 851 Damage Reduction
Attack Negated

Slam: 30 Base Damage, No Dice, +507 Know Your Enemy, +100 Storied Power = 637 Total Damage
Magical Girl Summit: 680 Base Resilience, +8 Dice, +95 Reactive Field, -100 Hostile Story Effect = 683 Damage Reduction
Attack Negated

Slam: 30 Base Damage, No Dice, +507 Know Your Enemy, +100 Storied Power = 637 Total Damage
Magical Girl Summit: 680 Base Resilience, +219 Dice, +95 Reactive Field, -100 Hostile Story Effect = 894 Damage Reduction
Attack Negated

Slam: 30 Base Damage, No Dice, +507 Know Your Enemy, +100 Storied Power = 637 Total Damage
Magical Girl Summit: 680 Base Resilience, +108 Dice, +95 Reactive Field, -100 Hostile Story Effect = 783 Damage Reduction
Attack Negated

Slam: 30 Base Damage, No Dice, +507 Know Your Enemy, +100 Storied Power = 637 Total Damage
Magical Girl Summit: 680 Base Resilience, +35 Dice, +95 Reactive Field, -100 Hostile Story Effect = 710 Damage Reduction
Attack Negated

Slam: 30 Base Damage, No Dice, +507 Know Your Enemy, +100 Storied Power = 637 Total Damage
Magical Girl Summit: 680 Base Resilience, +19 Dice, +95 Reactive Field, -100 Hostile Story Effect = 694 Damage Reduction
Attack Negated

0 Total Damage. Was that supposed to impress me?

Rose Whip: 750 Base Damage, +100 Dice, -50 From the Hip, +507 Know Your Enemy, +100 Storied Power = 1407 Total Damage
Magical Girl Summit: 680 Base Resilience, +54 Dice, +211 Reactive Field, -100 Hostile Story Effect = 845 Damage Reduction

562 Total Damage

Shred reduces Resilience by 28.

Magical Girl Summit: 4120 - 562 = 3558 Health

Magical Girl Heartstrings casts Keep Yourself Alive!
Magical Girl Wanton Green: 2685 + 600 = 3285 Health)

It hits like a jackhammer. Blow after blow strikes you without getting through your field. The assailants are little patches of air given form and strength through magic. Heartstrings visibly pales at how you've weathered the assault.

You ready to attack the animated bit of air, but they scatter away from you. Pulling your still-undecided Panoply back you fortify yourself against a stray blow coming from Wanton Green. She's lept back to her feet after being tossed ten meters.

Wanton Green has been empowered as well. The thorny vine she conjures from nowhere hits much harder than you would have expected, bits of the Panoply are sheared off by the attack. Blood flows from the pinpricks you've suffered.

"Keep your head down!" comes from the short wall the Practitioner conjured up. You tense as Heartstrings plays another note heavy with magic. But this one only heals the wounds Wanton Green has sustained.

You're going to have to concentrate on something. Right now it seems that your allies don't want to risk hitting you by firing upon the fight.

-End of tactical turn 1-
Actions: 4

[X] Choose Panoply Form: Free action. Choose the ability for the remainder of the round.
[X] Teleportation Effect? Free action, limit one
-[X] Write-in

[X] Clearing the Area! (Panoply must be set to Collateral Damage): Those Wind beasties are a major threat to everyone that isn't you. Destroy them while they're mostly in one place. Takes two actions. Summit's Inhuman Skill allows you to avoid damaging anything else.
[X] Ramming Speed! (Target): Send someone flying. Takes one action, but the following action must be a ranged attack (unless you've knocked them into a wall or teleported or something). Spell, can only be picked once.
[X] Wave Force (Target): Zaps real good. Takes four actions and the teleportation option. Spell, can only be picked once.
[X] Self-Repair: Attempt to remove the Shred debuff. And fix some of the damage
[X] Ready For Anything (Target): Intercept all attacks made by the selected target. Takes two actions
[X] Helping Hand (Panoply must be set to Manufacture): Get the tower gun set up now!
[X] Melee Attack (Target)
[X] Ranged Attack (Target)
[X] "Can't we all just get along?" (Target): Try to talk them down, somehow. Works best with four options and a plan.
-[X] Plan?
[X] Something exceedingly clever?

State of Forces:
Magical Girl Summit: Slightly Hurt (3558 Health) 28 Resilience lost to Shred debuff
Corey Feingold (Crack): Active
Milt Georges (Technician): Active
Jools Basil (Crack): Active
Stoo Newguard (Crack): Active
Henriette York (Practitioner): Active
Jops Wednesday (Technician): Active
Greg Ice (Technician): Feeling Invincible! Guardian Touch Active
Mark Miller and Mack Keller (Tower Crew): Moving a crew-served weapon (3 turns)

Magical Girl Waton Green: Slightly Hurt
Magical Girl Heartstrings: Very Nervous

+10 EXP The plot rears its ugly head...
+5 EXP Saved that guy
+2 EXP Met Magical Girl Wanton Green
+2 EXP Met Magical Girl Heartstrings

19 EXP Gained = 159 EXP Total

[X] EXP Spending Plan? (Do you want to level Self-Repair? )

Info post to follow.

 

[kelllogo]

They are trying to kill everyone in the base. You alter the Panoply into a suitable shape, tubes emerging from within and pointing in all directions. Long thorns from Wanton Green's attack snap as the configuration changes. The small patches of animated air could hide from you if they got behind something, they could do horrible damage with the magic empowering their blows. This has to be the first thing you do.

As you leap into the air Heartstrings snaps her wings to throw herself away from you. Behind you Wanton Green draws back her hand, another string of thorns appearing from nowhere.The animated air starts to scatter, one group breaking the truck's windshield to go through the cabin. About half dart to shield their leader - Magical Girl Heartstrings.

None of them escape your vision as you fire a dozen glowing orange shots among them.
Before the shots detonate you push out with the Panoply, pushing the top of the truck hard enough to shear the metal to throw off Wanton Green's aim. The barbed strand twists in mid-air to follow you.

!!!​

It twists around you, tearing bits of material from your panoply and puncturing your flesh. Pieces drift away from you as your ascent slows.

Spinning in midair and bleeding from another set of holes you pause slightly. Wanton Green has already started another attack, if you can time Ramming Speed just right…

"Ramming Speed!"

The attack bounces off the green field that springs up around you. Heartstrings drives the bow of her instrument into her chest an instant before you crash… through her into the ground?

You leap off of the thoroughly pulverized gravel while firing a trio of shots at Heartstrings, angling them so that they'll strike Wanton Green should they pass through.

"She's too strong!" Heartstrings wails right before she's hit by the projectiles.

(Explosive Panoply: 1040 Base Damage, -28 Damaged Panoply, +207 Dice, -100 Wide Area = 1119 Total Damage
Ramming Speed: Negated - Target Intangible!
Explosive Panoply (just Heartstrings): 1040 Base Damage, -28 Damaged Panoply, +81 Dice, +50 Easy Target, -571 Intangible Target = 572 Total Damage

Area Damage: 1119 Total Damage
Just Heartstrings: 1691 Total Damage

Magical Girl Wanton Green: 350 Base Resilience, +25 Dice = 375 Damage Reduction
Magical Girl Heartstrings: 270 Base Resilience, No Dice = 270 Damage Reduction
Wind Servant (x11): 500 Base Resilience, No Dice = 500 Damage Reduction

Magical Girl Wanton Green : 744 Total Damage
Love Conquers All: 80% Reduction

148 Final End Damage

Magical Girl Wanton Green: 3285 - 148 = 3137 Health


Wind Servants: 619 Damage to each

Wind Servant Health (x11) 30 - 619 = -589


Magical Girl Heartstrings: 1421 Final End Damage

Magical Girl Heartstrings: 2000 - 1421 = 579 Health

Magical Girl Wanton Green: 3137 + 250 Regenerated = 3387 Health

Rose Whip: 750 Base Damage, +7 Dice, +507 Know Your Enemy, +100 Storied Power = 1364 Damage
Magical Girl Summit: 680 Base Resilience, -28 Shred, +70 Dice, +204 Reactive Field, -100 Hostile Story Effect, +600 Faster Combatant Negated by Unerring! = 826 Damage Reduction

538 Damage

Rose Whip: Attack Lost! Target has High Speed Combat!

538 Total Damage

Shred reduces Resilience by 26

Magical Girl Summit: 3558 - 562 = 2996 Health

Summit Discerns Cupid's Arrow Finds the Mark!
Summit Discerns Love Conquers All!)

"I've almost got her! Just-" Wanton Green is interrupted in her speech and prepared attack by a soldier running from behind the truck.

"I am invincible!" the man who had been tossed over the truck yells. He seems to have lost his gun, but is holding a grenade in his outstretched hand.

Wanton Green flicks her wrist to strike him with yet another strand of thorns. He tumbles to the ground when it binds his legs together, but looks to be only slightly hurt by the foot-long barbs. It doesn't stop him from flinging the grenade at her, at least.

Satisfaction​

It feels good to know he's still alive.

Two more grenades sail over the truck. Wanton Green kicks the ground to backpedal swiftly. Only to have a head-sized rock slam into her, courtesy of the Earth spellcaster and her staff. Bright tracers fly into Wanton Green as she hits the ground with the wind knocked out of her.

During this excitement a vehicle rounds the corner. Corey is manning the top-mounted grenade launcher. He gives you an abbreviated wave while scanning the area.

(Rose Whip: 750 Base Damage, +74 Dice, +507 Know Your Enemy, +100 Storied Power = 1431 Damage

Greg: 75 Base Resilience, +680 Guardian Touch, No Dice, -100 Hostile Story Effect = 655 Damage Reduction

776 Total Damage

Shred reduces Resilience by 38.

Greg: 2075 - 776 = 1299 Health)

(Pebble to Boulder: 300 Base Damage +2 Dice +228 Spell Boost = 530 Total Damage
Personal Defense Weapon: 150 Base Damage, No Dice +30 Full Auto, +30 Full Auto, +30 Full Auto, +30 Full Auto, +30 Full Auto = 400 Total Damage

930 Total Damage

Magical Girl Wanton Green: 350 Base Resilience, +93 Dice, -100 Combo Attack = 343 Damage Reduction

587 Final End Damage

Magical Girl Wanton Green: 3387 - 587 = 2800 Health)

"Heartstrings!" Wanton Green grunts, voice hoarse but unnaturally loud.

Heartstrings doesn't seem to have withstood your last attack well. She's spinning downwards on the non-broken wing and one of her arms is bent the wrong way at the elbow, still clutching her fiddle.

Target Pacified​

The sight brings a measure of discomfort at the pain you've caused, balanced by an itch to ensure she stays down. Her companion has spotted the humvee and abandoned attacking in favor of frantically rolling towards cover.

Is it already over?

[X] [Heartstrings] Kill
[X] [Heartstrings] Guard
[X] [Heartstrings] Leave to attack Wanton Green
-[X] Plan?

[ooc]And now the hilariously one-sided nature of the "Sleep-in" scenario shows itself I really should have had Heartstrings hide that healing song...[/ooc]

-End of Tactical Turn 2-
State of Forces:
Magical Girl Summit: Slightly Hurt (2996 Health) 54 Resilience lost to Shred debuff
Corey Feingold (Crack): Attacking
Milt Georges (Technician): Driving
Jools Basil (Crack): Attacking
Stoo Newguard (Crack): Attacking
Henriette York (Practitioner): Firing
Jops Wednesday (Technician): Firing
Greg Ice (Technician): Hurt (1299 Health) Feeling less invincible. Guardian Touch Active, 38 Resilience lost to Shred debuff
Mark Miller and Mack Keller (Tower Crew): Moving a crew-served weapon (2 turns)

Magical Girl Wanton Green: Slightly Hurt, ShitShitShit!
Magical Girl Heartstrings: Badly Hurt

+10 EXP Decisive Action
+1 EXP Is it skydiving if you leave a crater with your face?
+33 EXP 11 Destroyed Wind Servants

44 EXP Gained = 203 EXP Total

(I'll add the abilities to the sheets in a bit, ('_',) gotta do some other stuff right now.)

 

[kelllogo]

Heartstrings touches down while your guns track the motion. Her leg gives out beneath her and she crumples to the ground, supporting herself with the elbow that holds the bow insider her chest.

"What are you waiting for?" she asks softly, eyes shut from pain despite lifting her head to look at you.

**???​

This would be the first time you killed a human. You were planning on it seconds ago, you expected to be satisfied after doing so. Was that you? How much did you allow that clarity to numb your fears and guide your actions?

"An explanation." you reply.

Behind you Wanton Green has stopped rolling on the ground and is holding her hand together are the wrist and shouting.

"Wait! I surrender! You win!" she shouts in that loud voice of hers.

Heartstrings shrinks as you watch. Magic dissipates and leaves a slightly shorter girl wearing a grey coat, red hat, and black snow pants. You note that her injuries have vanished, but she still curls upon herself.

**Why?​

These moods were always confusing. Last time you became introspective about where your thoughts of Discovery came from you turned clumsy and slow for several minutes. You turn your attention to the scene unfolding behind you.

"Detransform!" yells the Earth Practitioner. Her skin has taken the color and texture of marble and a small stone floats just beyond the end of her staff.

Wanton Green darts her eyes back and forth. "In a moment, I want to heal my-"

"No! Now!" shouts Corey, aiming the vehicle's grenade launcher at Green's feet.

Before Corey's words stop ringing in your ears Wanton Green snaps her hand downward, vines pushing into the ground right before she makes a sudden leap. Everything erupts into cacophony as grenades slam into the ground, bullets fly, and men scream.

(Magical Girl Wanton Green: 2800 + 250 Regenerated = 3050 Health

Entangle: 300 Base Damage, +19 Dice, +10 Treachery = 329 Total Damage

319 Total Damage

Jools: 100 Base Resilience, No Dice, -20 From Below = 80 Damage Reduction
Stoo: 100 Base Resilience, No Dice, -20 From Below = 80 Damage Reduction

249 Final End Damage

Jools: 500 - 239 = 251 Health
Stoo: 500 - 239 = 251 Health

Jools: Bound, Suffocating
Stoo: Bound, Suffocating

Mk 19 Grenade Launcher: 400 Base Damage, +80 Full Auto, +80 Full Auto, +80 Full Auto, +80 Full Auto, +80 Full Auto, -600 Airborne Target, +20 Magic Grenades = 220 Total Damage
Pebble to Boulder: 300 Base Damage, +125 Dice, +249 Spell Boost, -150 Glancing Hit = 524 Total Damage
Personal Defense Weapon: Needs to Reload!

744 Total Damage

Magical Girl Wanton Green: 350 Base Resilience +88 Dice, +70 Fancy Acrobatics, +10 Treachery = 518 Damage Reduction

226 Final End Damage

Magical Girl Wanton Green: 3050 - 226 = 2824 Health)

Wanton Green is three meters in the air by the time you realize what happened. Heartstrings is diving under the cab of the truck. Shattered glass hits the ground below the windows. The soldier you had shielded is running back to the other side of the truck with a knife. The air where the grenades detonated has been inexplicably (Brandcraft) set aflame. And Wanton Green has contorted herself and conjured another one of her whips.

**No​

Pulling on the fabric of reality puts you between the target and your enemy. You gauntlet grows in size to deflect its attack.

(Rose Whip: 750 Base Damage, +78 Dice, +507 Know Your Enemy, -150 Awkward Attack, +100 Storied Power = 1207 Total Damage
Intercept!
Panoply: 1040 Base Damage, -54 Damaged Panoply, +240 Dice = 1226 Total Damage

19 Difference, Panoply wins.

Panoply:19 Intercept Damage, -54 Damage Panoply, +244 Dice = 209 Total Damage
Wanton Green: 350 Base Resilience, +49 Dice, -100 What the Hell!, -50 Unable to Dodge = 249 Damage Reduction
Attack Negated)

**No More!​

You hadn't expected to overcome its blows, just scatter the attack enough that it would be too diffuse to harm you. However, when you make the counterstroke you know that you've gotten the better of the exchange. The blow fails to mark your opponent but sent it spinning uncontrollably to the ground.

You catch a glimpse of the expression as it falls - for the first time since you began fighting it feels fear.

Right before it hits the ground you curse your slower thoughts, if you had used Ramming Speed you could have flung your enemy into the air repeatedly. On the ground you can't attack from the right angle to launch into the air.

"You monster" hisses the enemy, glaring at you.

The best way to attack would be to alter your Panoply to its largest form and crush her until there's…. Or would that not do enough damage to overcome her regeneration?

Below you Wanton Green has stopped her brief effort to stand and is holding her hands up together by the wrists once more.

"For real this time! You got me!" she shouts at the base's defenders.

(Magical Girl Wanton Green: 2824+ 250 Regenerated = 3074 Health

Mk 19 Grenade Launcher: 400 Base Damage, +80 Full Auto, +80 Full Auto, +80 Full Auto, +80 Full Auto, +80 Full Auto, +20 Magic Grenades, +50 Prone Target = 870 Total Damage
Pebble to Boulder: 300 Base Damage, +69 Dice, +203 Spell Boost, +100 Righteous Fury = 672 Total Damage
Personal Defense Weapon: 150 Base Damage, No Dice +30 Full Auto, +30 Full Auto, +30 Full Auto, +30 Full Auto, +30 Full Auto = 300 Total Damage

Counter-Force: 1842 Unified Damage, x2 Synchronize Bonus (Hail of Projectiles) = 3684 Total Damage

Wanton Green: 350 Base Resilience, +85 Dice, -100 Prone = 335 Damage Reduction

3349 Total End Damage

Wanton Green: 3074 - 3349 = -275 Health)

Bullets fly to answer her plea, followed shortly after by a volley of grenades. Wanton Green manages to somehow rise to her feet while suffering a direct hit from a grenade and begins running. The fire that hangs in the air from the grenades stays on her as she moves, until the Earth spellcaster lands a solid blow on her head.

Wanton Green flops to the ground, magic disappearing before the body's finished moving.

**Fall and be forgotten, I celebrate your final breath​

You've won. Satisfaction wells up inside you, mirrored by a sensation of disgust for being happy someone died. Looking over the field you see that everyone else is still alive. The soldier that charged Green had cut the vines that were choking the pair by the truck, the mage and her teammate were unharmed behind the barrier she conjured, and Corey hadn't been so much as scratched thanks to your intervention.

Perhaps this was something to be proud of after all. Even if the lingering flame of the grenades was setting fire to a couple of the buildings, despite the terrible damage the brief fight had done to the truck and antenna farm, you had kept all of your new comrades alive. The sense of disgust might just be from the scent of burning hair, Wanton Green's body was still aflame.

The odd sparks from where the patches of animated wind had been destroyed was like a bit of decoration for the base. Certainly more appealing to you than the blood splatters from yourself and Wanton Green staining the ice.

Come to think of it you should do something about the broken windows, equipment, and fires.

You stop flying and hit the ground with a solid thump. As if on cue everyone starts shouting at you for answers.

Is she really dead? Yes. Where's the other one? Hiding under the truck cab. What were you shooting at? When?

The question and answer session is cut short when you point out that things are still on fire. Over the next twenty minutes you find yourself in the unexpected position of leader as you direct the troops of the base to gather supplies that allow you to repair the damage you see. It feels like everyone tried to introduce themselves and everyone else as you work and keep an eye on the depowered Heartstrings.
----

"It runs better than it ever has." Greg says. "If you get tired of being a Magical Girl you could make a killing fixing cars and trucks. My cousin has a mustang that we've been trying to restore."

"Thank you." you say perfunctorily, the workings and uses of cars being of little interest to you.

There is a thought of being able to to build a supersonic jet that appeals. You had never flown for such a prolonged period before yesterday, and it was slower and more tiring than you expected. Having something to fly for you when you went from place to place to add them as Gating destinations would be useful.

Greg shrugs. "I'm the one thanking you. If you hadn't used that glowy stuff I would be a goner. Say, did you have to fill in the divot I made? No one got any pictures."

You don't reply, letting silence fill the garage where you are keeping watch over Heartstrings. In the last hour the major had found the truck she and Wanton Green had arrived in. You had caught her name in a snippet of radio talk to be Alexandria Vega, she had stayed quiet and passive since she had dropped her transformation. Even now she's slumped down on the cot that was provided.

After a respectable number of minutes have passed you pull your data mine from nowhere and bring the Funniest Cats of October playlist back up. Unluckily you have to endure a 30 second commercial about Counter Force Logistics and Manufacturing jobs before being allowed to view a 22 second video of a cat slipping into water. Still worth it on the whole you judge.
----

Guard duty was a heavy burden. You reflected on this while Alex sat next to you giving a running commentary on an online series about magic and music theory. A heavy burden indeed.

"...Which is to say, it gives feedback about things that sound right being right. It's like turning a set of numbers into a picture to analyze it, the pattern stands out. Music is full of patterns, so a good audio representation is much more useful for teaching how to make new magic. Lindy-lindy has a good video on this. I can't recommend her for full study because she thinks percussion is better than strings." She pauses for a moment while fiddling with your Data Mine.

"Now, she's going to give reasons for percussion, but the varied fundamentals of strings give you a hundred times the tones to work with. If Lindy had looked further than trying to copy magic binary I wouldn't have to point this out, but it's still a good-"

Alex trails off at the door sounds. Whatever rapport she felt she had with you did not extend to anyone else on base.

"Hello princess! I brought chow." Lieutenant York announces, tray held in her trailing arm.

"How long has it been?" your panoply says just over four hours, but you feel like it's been longer.

"Ah, you were assigned to jail our guest here at eleven-forty-two, so four hours - just a bit over four hours. Everyone's been busy." she pushes the tray onto a flat spot of your expressed Panoply, you grab it when she lets go. "Still, we all want to hear her sing. I could hear her talking when I was before the door. Is she going to answer questions?"

On the other side of you Alex went pale. There was a moment when you thought she was going to say something, but only a squeak came out.

You push a mechanical claw to the top of your Panoply and move the tray of food over to her.

Alex takes a breath, "It's really creepy how you sometimes do stuff without looking."

"You still haven't explained things to me." you point out as she grabs the food tray.

York makes an exaggerated face and brings her hands to her cheeks. "Oh my. Are you already in such a relationship? How scandalous~ princess." she says.

Alexandria first gets a sheepish expression from your comment, then a sudden blush from York's taunt. She spoons another mouthful of beans into her mouth and scoots back to better hide behind you.

York's expression hardens. "Miss Vega, we've already informed your parents. If you have the wish to stay with Princess Summit here, then you must start talking soon." she maneuvers around you to trap Alex between the wall, herself, and you. "Otherwise it must happen that you will be introduced to some of my other friends. While I think they are good people I have the feelings that you will not enjoy meeting them. Just some advice."

She turns to leave, pausing at the door to speak. "Oh, Princess? don't let her take all your food, I'm not bringing you more." then exits letting a blast of cold air in through the opening door.

Alex looks at the floor for a little while, she snaps out of it when her stomach grumbles and starts eating your food again.

After she's had your idea of a fair portion you cover the tray and begin eating yourself.

There's a minute or so before Alex starts talking again.

"I shouldn't have listened to Hannah. She hauled me out of bed just after midnight and said she needed help rescuing someone." she says quietly. "When you punched her I thought you were going to hit me next. I just… sort of acted before I could think."

"Trying to kill me was a reflex?" you ask.

She hangs her head at that. "I guess… Hannah had a bunch of pull? Is that the right word? She give me a lot of money for healing people last month and had a bunch of people who also thought the Pillar was on the verge of collapse." Alex lets out a sigh. "She always seemed to know what was going on. I guess I wanted her to be right. That the war was going to stop and Magical Girls would keep the rest of the universe from messing with humanity. It all sounded good when she said it."

"She's wrong. I was a little girl during the collapse of the old world." you shake recalling the memory. "My dad died when Patrick George Dallas was trying to kill Magical Girl Final Breath. During that last sweep he did to gather more corpses, dad was in the area trying to help evacuation when the undead snuck in through the storm drains." you turn your face so that your eyes meet Alex's. "That is what Wanton Green was talking about, Anarchy - where any madman with a bit of power starts destroying people because they can. If Magical Girls have a duty to protect humanity we also have a duty to preserve society."

Alex matches your gaze for a moment, then her composure breaks and she starts sobbing. You remain impassive as she grips onto you for support while crying. A short while of this has her trying to pull herself together.

"Wait! I-the… *sniff*. There's a phone! Hannah kept *sniff* a list! I can, get the screen thing. *sniff* I know her password! Please don't let them send me somewhere! Please!" she takes a few deep breaths and pulls off her hat to wipe her eyes. "Mama's gonna kill me."
----

It wasn't long after Alex told about the phone that she fell asleep on the provided cot. York had returned, placed some kind of inscribed magic cloth that stuck to Alex's eyes, and told you that she would stay asleep for the next day or two.

Which then moved to the topic of gossip, about you of course.

"I, of course, know nothing of the details. What I've heard is that the Major tried declare you an emergency. There was alleged actions that make you look suspicious, it might have been someone picking up traces from your location during the time you were sleeping."

"I wasn't in my Magical Girl form at that time. I can't use magic unless I've transformed." You point out.

"Yes, that's the very thing a little bird told me! The bird also said that it hasn't seen these traces during the time you have stayed in the garage. This surprised the bird because the pulse was regular, to a fraction of a second, beforehand. I thought you might like to hear that."

You had the feeling that this wasn't typical gossip. Something was tracking you, and only when you couldn't notice it. You had a hunch of who it might be.

"Marax. There's a demon that had a collection of strange magic items. He's the one that had a space-warping item that held me prisoner for years. Once when he was taunting me he said he could always find me, last I saw of him he was running with his tail between his legs while I was shooting at him." you clench your fist. "He got away with some kind of teleportation item. I then broke or absorbed his stuff and started trying to get home. If he's chasing me I would like him to show his ugly face in person."

"Regrettably I don't know anything about this for certain. Still, it's worthwhile to hear what people are talking about. May your efforts to eliminate that mar on existence bear fruit, Princess." York said.
----

"Commander Mason outranks me, but even if he's pulling you away before the investigation finishes know that I will investigate." Major Gordon places a watermarked sheet of paper on the desk close to you. "With Heartstrings contained for now you may depart now."

"What's going to happen to Ale-er, Miss Vega?" You ask.

"You don't need to concern yourself with that." Replies the major sternly.
----

Operation Meadow Grass is canceled, effective immediately.

Return to Firebase Momo immediately and prepare for deployment. Due to your recent entrance into the Counter Force debriefing will only involve the other participants of this incident.

*Seal of Commander Rogue Mason*

----

That's all you can do here you suppose. You draw upon your knowledge of where Firebase Momo is and prepare to fling yourself there through your magic.


Grading
Allied Deaths: None! Perfect! +50 EXP
Allied Injuries: 2 soldiers incapacitated. Insignificant damage to Greg and Summit. Adequate. +5 EXP
Killed Magical Girl Wanton Green: Adequate. +200 EXP
Subdued Magical Girl Heartstrings: Adequate: +100 EXP
Fought in the middle of an active military base: Neutral. +0 EXP
Helped Greg Ice earn a medal: Good! +5 EXP
Property damage: Sufficient. Mostly fixed thanks to Manufacture. +10 EXP
Concluded Operation Meadow Green (visit sites to act as hubs for rapid teleportation): +1 EXP


370 EXP Gained = 573 EXP Total

QuestChapter Complete!

[ooc]And Done! I'll go over some of the options that weren't picked and their effects later if anyones interested. Maybe try to hunt down a picture for a Henriette York sheet.

For fun, does anyone want to point out hints that Heartstrings is not as innocent as she claims she is?

Sorry for not keeping to a weekly-ish schedule. orz[/ooc]

 

[kelllogo]

Silver Chevalier's attention went directly to you when she entered the hall. With rapid quick steps she zeroed in on the seat next to you. Using the hand that isn't holding a blueberry muffin you swat her hand away from the two that remain of your dessert.

She grabs your hand and uses the other to grab a muffin.

A brief tussle sees your seat broken, the two of you on the floor, and Silver Chevalier with a mouth full of one of your muffins. With your gazes locked you see not the slightest hint of regret. The two of you chew your food for several seconds in the suddenly quiet food hall.

Chevalier finishes first. "Who are you and what have you done with Summit?" She teases.

You roll aside and let Chevalier roll out from underneath you. "I'm not sure I understand the question."

"You're wearing a dress and have your hair done nicely. I thought you were a new magical girl for a bit." She leans on the table and swipes for the last muffin. You yank it through the intervening space before she gets ahold of it. "Are you trying to look nice for somebody?"

"Ah, that's not quite it." You stand up from sitting on the floor. "I was looking for simple clothing so that I could try adding and removing it from my Panoply. When I was there an elf insisted I allow them to work with my hair."

"You've met Sabina Ashe I take it." She gives you a thumbs up. You eat about half of the muffin while she looks at you. "She's really nice, a huge MGroupie, but nice. Sabina likes knitting and hairdressing, you could make her day by asking for a scarf."

"I see. And why did you steal my food?"

Chevalier's grin goes feral. "Just trying to help your diet. I know you barely spend any time exercising, so I thought I'd help keep your weight low by sharing food."

You eat the last bit of muffin and answer by gripping your left elbow with your left hand, showing that your fingers reach all the way around.

"See! You should have muscle there! If you keep lazing around you're going to turn squishy, if you have any pride in yourself as a Magical Girl you will begin a training regime." Chevalier crosses her arms under her chest. "In fact, I'll help oversee it. I challenge you to a spar to test your strength and will! Do you accept?"

You pick up your water bottle from the table and take a swig to clear your throat. "How will this be different from last time?"

Her face turns a bit red. "And this time you can't use that Ramming Speed move of yours! It's dishonorable to fly away from your foes instead of facing them head on."

"I'm not sure I like that rule. Could you tie both of my hands behind my back instead?"

"We both know that wouldn't mean anything! Are you afraid of Honorable combat?"

You walk towards the door, leaving the broken chair and a small crowd of gawkers behind. Chevalier stays right behind you though. You can see her trying to glare through the back of your head.

You pause and let out a sigh. "I prefer noticing what my opponent can do, then acting in a way that keeps them from being able to hurt me. If exposing myself to risk is honorable? I'm not afraid of it, but don't see why you think it's important."

"Turn around when you talk to someone." She mutters. "The point is that I can't learn from you if you just send me careening around the field. And in a real fight I'd have somebody who could knock you out from the sky anyway."

"Who broke the chair?" A booming voice asked from the other end of the crowd.

Taking it as a cue you teleport outside. Silver Chevalier can handle things on her own, and she did get dirt on your new dress.

You take a moment to feel satisfied in yourself before an angry looking elf bursts out from the building.

"I am Centurion Gaius! Your disorderly behavior means you are also spending the rest of the day cleaning the floors."

He stands a bit under two meters tall. His black hair is slightly curly, and his face is round -- though creased by a sharp glare. The armor he has is marked with several symbols, you think you see two degree marks but are unclear on what they mean.

More to the point, he's an elven officer, not part of the Counter Force or placed in authority over you.

You walk back into the hall, Chevalier shouldn't let herself be pushed around by this man.

"I don't hear an 'acknowledged'!" Bellows Gaius.

Your response is a stare as you push open the door. Inside Chevalier has a sheepish expression and is being pointed to a closet by another soldier

"Chevalier? Do you want to spend the rest of the day cleaning? I thought you were going to teach me your exercise routine." You ask.

"Um, I think we're in trouble at the moment." She mutters.

"Your punishment is not optional! For that you can spend tomorrow cleaning the building as well." Gaius shouts, jabbing his finger into your back. "Look at me when I'm talking to you, child!"

You step forward and spin. As you do so, the Panoply extends from backpack form to cover and frame you. By the time you face Gaius you are supported above the ground to make yourself taller than him. The black surface of your weapon writhes as you manifest speakers to amplify your speech.

Gaius takes a step back.

"Summit! Don't kill him!" Demands Chevalier.

"I'm not going to." You reply, then turn your head back. "I am Magical Girl Summit." The Panoply rumbles a bass undertone to your voice. "And your demand would make me unable to follow current orders. So I will not be cleaning for the rest of the day. Would it be acceptable if-"

"Don't talk back to-" Gaius tries to cut you off, finding his voice. You slam a part of the Panoply into the floor next to him to cut him off.

You bring your face close to his and talk quietly in the ensuing silence. "Don't. Talk. Back. To me."

His face goes red and his hand grips the sword at his side. Then his eyes dart to the mass of the Panoply hanging above him. Color drains out of Gaius's face and he releases the grip on his sword. With his eyes on you he steps back the few paces to the door and slips out.

You hear running feet.

"Oh… I'm going to hear about this later." Moans Chevalier. "Say, what was that about orders anyway?"

You retract the Panoply into a backpack form before answering. "I got a written sheet with orders to 'stay within the bounds of Firebase Momo' and 'attend to various and sundry duties to support future deployments'. If I spent all day mopping floors I would not be able to attend to other actions that allow me to fight effectively."

Chevalier gives you a thumbs-up. "Those! Thanks, I never thought about it that way. That means my training is more important than the angry guy, doesn't it."

"You should still clean up the chair you broke."

"But it was your~ chair." She protests with a sing-song voice.

You run your hand over your face. It's less trouble to just clean it yourself instead of arguing.
----

Exercising goes poorly.

Apparently you ran 'wrong', and lacked the strength to do a pull-up. At Chevalier's insistence you swap between jumping jacks and sit ups until moving feels like too much trouble. It takes about four minutes, after which Chevalier seems to have absorbed all the smug you had felt about your earlier victory.

With sore everything you watch her go through her routine while using the Panoply as a lawn chair. Nothing could get you to move right now, all you want is some rest. Maybe you'll get your breath back by tomorrow.

A figure in green approaches. One you recognize.

Rest can be had later, you much prefer to stay far away from the crazy trainer guy. With a mental effort there becomes here and you are thankfully far away from Chevalier's personal trainer.

Hmm. Are you friends with Chevalier now? Maybe she could get her friends to tone it done for you.
----

Recalling yesterday's extended journey you head to the hangers to see if you can get your hands on anything that could be turned into a personal aircraft. Before you've even gotten to explain yourself the area is awash in excitement. With a bit of concentration you hear several conversations over radio, the words "multiple casualties" are repeated a few times.

Finding a corner that seems less excited you wait out the minutes until the helicopters come into view. As the first one starts to touch down a purple-haired figure (Purity, Faith, Divinity) leaps out the the second helicopter, cradling a smaller figure (Purity, Faith, Divinity). One of the Drives and Cores, whichever ones the purple belonged to. You had a bit of trouble with how their magic was overwhelmingly the same. She zooms off towards the infirmary.

Shortly afterwards Magical Girl Red Rose strides out of the first helicopter, a body slung over her shoulder and a grim expression over her face. Followed by Insight, and a girl you don't recognize (Keyblade, Song, Legend-Maker???). Once they've cleared the exit a handful of men with stretchers move in. You don't have a clear look, but you think there are a handful of unconscious people in the helicopter.

Your heart leaps into your mouth and all thought of getting a closer look departs. A blazing figure of gold disembarks from the second helicopter (Rule, Annihilation, Epic). The earth thrumming as Goddess Gold deigns to walk upon it once more. The Goddess casts her gaze around and points to you.

"You look strong, help carry Team GEAR and their heavy armor to the infirmary." She marches off with waiting for or expecting a reply.

A quick hustle has you looking at the outrageously armored forms of Solid Core's team. Before you enter a small armored figure (Earth, Wind) darts out. Inside Gabriel is propped on a seat, and a couple of people you aren't familiar with are lying on the floor (Library and Fire).

"Are they safe to pick up?" You ask the team members that are still slumped in the seats.

"Yeah, we dragged them in here when we left." Says the closer one.

He pushes himself upright and steps over Gabriel. The further soldier groans and stands up as well.

Insight pops her head into the helicopter. "Physically they're perfectly fine, Brilliant Key fixed them up. They're just overwhelmed from excessive healing."

"Oh." You extend the Panoply to sling Gabriel over your shoulder and the other two under your free arm. With a bit of shifting you have all three of them secured. The remaining two follow after you leave.

Traveling to the infirmary doesn't take very long at all, the Panoply bearing the weight of your passengers easily. As you depart you see behind you that the unconscious people in the first helicopter were all magical girls, powerful ones judging by their Affinities.

What were they doing that needing ten magical girls? Or eleven if Red Rose had been carrying one of the ones sent. What warranted sending Goddess Gold, Solid Core and Drive, Red Rose, and all the others.

"Penny for your thoughts." Asks one of Solid Core's minions.

"Oh." You stay quiet for a bit. "How did you survive fighting something that knocked," you make a gesture with your elbow towards the stretcher groups following, "them out. Red Rose and Goddess Gold alone…."

"Now that," he holds an armored finger to the front of his helmet. "Is a secret! Why did you decide to join, last I heard you ran off because of Gabriel."

You look blankly at him. "Sore wa… himitsu dessu"

For once you recognize a reference, back when you were staying in a Unification Crusade camp they would show Slayers and other shows featuring magic-using heroes all the time. He might even have watched the show in similar circumstances as you did, seated on benches with dozens of other children.

"Ha!" The other ambulatory human of Team GEAR interrupts.

The first of the pair stops and tracks the other with his helmet. Which the latter responses to by also stopping and tucking one arm under the other. This stand off continues while you keep a steady pace, leaving them behind.

Walking the rest of the way is uneventful. Soon you've made it to the, still under construction (like almost everything else on base), infirmary. You're instructed to just place the three you're carrying on the floor near Solid Core, they are apparently "too heavy" in their armor. Stepping to the corner where Solid Core is curled up on one of the chairs while Solid Drive fiddles with the younger one's hair. Solid Core casts a glance at you and your passengers before resting her head in Solid Drive's lap.

Solid Core doesn't look very healthy. Her skin is greyed and cracked, fluid is leaking from her eyes as she tries to shut ragged eyelids, and her right leg turns black about halfway down from the knee.

You set the trio down gently and turn to leave.

"If you're curious? White Soul was a bitch." Solid Drive said.

"It looks worse than it is." Solid Core croaks out. "My nerves are mostly gone, thankfully…."

You've seen three days dead corpses that looked more alive. Best not to say that out loud.

With a quickened pace you slip out of the infirmity.
----

There's a bit of time left in the day, you consider your options for what to do.

Pick One:
[X] Take Silver Chevalier up on her offer of sparring without flying or Ramming Speed.
-[X] And work on honest skill.
-[X] And cheat by teleporting into the sky and using ranged attacks to defeat her.
[X] Find Red Rose. Maybe you can get her autograph?
[X] Pick a fight with the new Legend-Maker so she can see what someone of that growth affinity is capable of doing. (Get rekt by Brilliant Key, who's a bit worn out but would find Summit's ignorance amusing.)
[X] Practice your new spell, maybe you'll learn something.
[X] Fail to think of something more important than asking Gaia about your weird dream.
[X] Try to get something else to absorb.

+5 EXP Let someone know they aren't your supervisor.
+5 EXP Hung out with Silver Chevalier for a bit.
+10 EXP Lots of new faces, lots of new questions.

573 + 20 = 593 Total EXP.

 

[kelllogo]

A bit of searching (and judicious use of flying) finds Insight and the new girl seated in an administrative building, sorting a small pile of plastic cards between them. Insight tucks away a handful of receipt paper and grins at your approach. The new girl sighs and taps a hand with cards tucked between her fingers on the table.

"What did I tell you?" Insight said.

"Uh. Hello, I'm Magical Girl Summit." You introduce yourself. "My Affinities are Discovery, Protection, and Implacable. I can already tell yours, so you don't need to… uh." You finish weakly.

"But the important one here is Legend-Maker." Insight said, lowering her voice for the last word.

The new girl tucked the cards in her hand into a pouch, which she held between herself and my position, and picked up another stack of 'her' cards from the pile.

"Well?" Insight asked me. "Wait. You don't actually know. Oh my God, this is great, you don't want Key's autograph at all."

'Key' shot a look at Insight, then at myself. "I'm Magical Girl Brilliant Key. Sorry about being stand-offish, most of the time I don't need to introduce myself."

Insight pipes up. "Summit flies very quickly, and can teleport. She also has this move that shoots her at a target really fast and makes her glow green, you can't hurt her while she glowing from that." Insight keeps talking even as you turn you head to look at her. "There's something else she does, but I haven't seen it in action yet. You don't need to hold back either, Summit is tough."

She's… giving advice to Brilliant Key? Advice for fighting you.

Was that what you wanted to do? And would asking Key to spar after a rough mission be polite? With Insight's glee and the oddity you couldn't discern about Brilliant Key, well with all that you had enough of a reason to avoid the issue.

"That's very impressive Summit. Maybe you'll be famous as a powerful Legend-Maker soon." Brilliant Key said, smiling.

"Thank you. I'm sure your last mission wasn't easy." You reply. "It was nice to meet you, but there's someone else I should talk with."

Insight pushes herself up with her arms. "Hey! Are you just going to back out?"

"Back out of what?" Brilliant Key asks, setting her pouch back down as she spoke.

"I'm not sure what you mean." You say.

Insight finishes standing up and points at you. "You were going to ask Brilliant Key to spar with you. Isn't that why you chased us down, so you could wow another Legend-Maker with your crazy abilities?"

Brilliant Key's face assumes a quizzical expression as she looks between you and Insight.

You shrug.

"Yes, really." Insight speaks to Brilliant Key. "Come on! Challenge her already! You know you want to." She says to you.

"I should go." You say just before teleporting away.

As you start another circuit of the base you decide you'll need to look up Brilliant Key by the next time you meet Insight.
----

When you tried focusing to 'see' Gaia it resulted in everything in your field of vision pinging as having all of Gaia's elements, just like in your dream. Well, not quite everything, a group of angels didn't register even though the sky, ground, and you did. Knowing it was coming helped avoid the sensation of being devoured by something incomprehensibly powerful.

A not-quite shift in perception has the effect stop. You'll need to think of something else if you want to stalk, er, find Gaia.

You take to the air again, looking for anyone with Magic and Epic. Nothing stands out.

Floating in the air you find yourself at a loss for how to proceed. You hang in the sky for a couple minutes trying to think of a way to search inside tents and buildings without just teleporting inside of them.

An interruption shows itself. Hero WEAPON had shown up in your field of vision, by jumping several dozen meters into the air. With a slow flip she lands back on the ground and lands behind a tent.

That's convenient.

Yanking the intervening space pulls you right behind Hero as she enters the tent.

"Alright I did it. Anything else you want to bother me about?" Hero says to a woman--Gaia--lounging on a couch.

Gaia waves her hand in a non-committal gesture. Hero grumps softly and turns around to close the tent door, she starts at seeing you then relaxes again. Hero pulls your shoulder to bring you inside enough for her to finish closing the door.

"Were you expecting Summit?" Hero asks with an exasperated tone.

"Guess." You can almost feel the grin in Gaia's voice. "Summit! Come sit next to me, I've got an anime you might like going."

You extract yourself from Hero WEAPON gently and make your way to Gaia's couch. You slide the Panoply over one of the sides and sit as far from Gaia as you can manage. Gaia sits upright, scoots over to you, and puts her arm on your shoulder.

"This girl is trying to study magic to impress a guy, but she's found a conspiracy that…" She all but shoves a tablet into your face.

The video playing has the apparent lead holding a blanket with one hand to cover herself while sitting up in bed. Is this the sort of thing the soul and will of Earth enjoys?

"Sh-Sugar! I swear, two minutes ago they were using transforming magic guns to fight conjured monsters. It's not that kind of anime." Gaia yanks the tablet to the other side of her. "Now I, of course, know what you've come here to talk about. Tradition demands that you ask anyway before I give you a sideways answer."

You're shaking with nervousness. Part of you wonders why, it's not like you're any further away from something that could consider you part of her. Take a breath and calmly… what was that about a sideways answer?

"Don't you mean a straight answer?" You point out.

"I don't do straight answers anymore, not since the accident." Gaia replies.

Hero walked back into sight with a bowl of popcorn, moving to the open end of the couch.

"So from now on it's sideways answers and levity for inquiring minds." Gaia continues. "Unless you've decided to take me up on my offer."

"I don't remember any offer." You answer.

"It's for the best, Mother mostly gives me sideways answers." Hero interjects. "Did I miss Fiona getting Kei?"

"Nah, Kei wussed out and Fiona told him he was brave and to find his promised childhood friend." Gaia answers.

"Damn it! How does he not see that Fiona is his childhood friend. This is almost as annoying as that love triangle last summer where the guy won't go for Magical Girl Sweet Dreams because he wants to stay loyal to her 'normal' self." Hero took a few bits of popcorn. "How about Sin-4? Did he get away?"

"Nope. Kei pointed Sin out to the regulators, he's very blasted right now."

You have no idea what they're talking about.

"Double damn it. What are they planning for the finale if the killed off the only thinking antagonist left?"

"You'll just have to watch it to find out." Gaia pats your shoulder. "And it's actually good you don't remember my offer. Saves me a bunch of trouble."

"...I had a dream where I saw that…. Um. That I had forgotten that you were Gaia after seeing." You make an encompassing gesture with your hand. "All the magic shining everywhere. Everything as a part of you, even myself. It was like something had grabbed me and I couldn't get away."

Gaia tosses her tablet into Hero's popcorn bowl and hugs you.

"If that happened… what happened to me? What did you do to me that made me forget?" You ask.

"Really, at that point it was more like doing something to myself. You're still a bit …unhinged from spending so much time alone and away from me. When your magic noticed it went overboard and you tried to subsume yourself. Since you didn't really want to dissolve your sense of identity, and I didn't want to absorb you-it was a simple fix." Gaia explains.

"Thanks?" You offer. You're not sure how you feel about being described as unhinged.

"No problem! I did say I wanted you independent, didn't I? Since you're grateful at the moment maybe I could ask you to do some things for me?" Gaia stops hugging you and moves her arms to rest on the back of the couch.

"I don't want to betray the Counter Force-" You begin.

"Oh, nothing like that! First, I want you to keep your eyes open around the non-humans try to figure out what they're planning, for yourself if nothing else. Second, if you ever see one of my WEAPONs fighting... well, you should be running away as soon as you notice them. Got that?" She taps her finger against your forehead. "Since you're such an interesting person to watch I'll give you a present for all this."

You rub the spot where Gaia tapped you. "What kind of present?"

"You've already got it, it might just take a while to notice." Gaia gives a thumbs-up. "Now, would you like to stick around for the next episode? Hero made popcorn."

You excuse yourself, it's going to be an early day tomorrow and sleeping in your transformed state never feels as restful.
----

A good thing about Momo is that it doesn't have a shortage of pillows. It's quite comforting to be able to bury yourself in pillows. With fluff covering your sight you drift off to sleep.

What seems like moments later a clock blasts a shrill alarm.

That's a signal, you remember, it means you have about three minutes left of your transformation. You extract yourself from the nest of pillows and stand next to your bed. A bit of concentration lets the magic flow out of you. This time you get it right, your purchased dress appearing over the (ridiculous) uniform.

You shiver a bit as the chill air becomes noticeable. Another reason to stay transformed as much as you could manage.

"From the peaks I watch! I am Magical Girl Summit!"

The burst of invigoration fades rapidly. You work yourself back under the pillows and go back to sleep.
----

Morning arrived, and with it the appointed hour of awakening, all too soon. You take a moment to refresh your transformation before walking to the showers.

Showering is a different experience without balancing the discomfort of cold air and too-hot spray. You could probably stand under a stream of boiling water without injury as Magical Girl Summit--or one that's ice cold, like these showers presently are. Which would explain why these stalls are deserted. The whole experience is odd without reactions to temperature. You clean up quickly and stretch your MG outfit open at the neck to fit back into it.

On a whim you even out your hair to make it look closer to how the elf yesterday had styled it.

Breakfast is a bit more lively. You get hash browns, sausages, and a small container of raspberries to eat.

You deflect questions about yesterday's events. Most of them you weren't here for and don't know about. Other questions about your Panoply you answer in general terms. You accrue a bit of an audience from turning a knife into a spoon and back, but after most people have seen the change it disperses.

One brief flight later brings you to the tent where Commander Mason has his command setup.

Inside is relatively sparely occupied compared to the space available. Commander Mason sits on one end of the tent listening to an angel on one side and a soldier (Hewett, by her nameplate) on the other, a trio of coffee cups on the desk in front of him. Closer to you a pair of soldiers are going through the clipboards stacked on a large table.

There's a few elves present as well, the apparent leader (Water) is seated on a folding chair. Behind her a pair of armored elves stand straight with their right hand holding their left wrist as their arms hang down in front of them. One of them is Gaius from yesterday.

You're a bit early, but not by too much. With a smooth motion you move to Mason's corner of the command tent and compose yourself and Panoply to a respectful pose.

"I'm here, Commander." You said.

Mason glances over at you, gives a quick nod, and goes back to paying attention to Hewett.

You stay with your hands held behind you while they exchange metal covered clipboards. The names on them grab your attention when you get a glimpse of two of them. Silver Hero, and Summit. You strain to hear them, but can't make anything out. You suspect the angel can tune his aura to prevent eavesdropping.

On the side Gaius has gone a bit red after you spoke. He stays put without further movement. You do the same.

After several minutes Mason puts a few papers into the 'Summit' clipboard and touches the base of it with his thumb. There's a small spark of magic as the metal cover fuses itself to the base.

"Good to see you're here on time Summit. Yesterday brought in four more girls to keep track of, enough that I'd like to offer you the chance to help a few of my friends." The Commander opens a drawer of his desk and drops two bundles of stapled paper. "First option is to help out the Milidia garrison. Your fast flight and newly-discovered ability to repair could be very valuable, and they always need more help. Second option is to go to the Fairy Home Realms and work with Joy Oak for a bit. Joy has a rare talent for blood magic, which is how we suspect the tracking on you is being done. Right now Joy is leading a suicide squad, you'd be assisting her for a week or so. Lastly, there's been a number of interesting revelations from the girls recovered yesterday. If you feel up to infiltrating Hell and finding Goddess Red and Goddess Grey it could have a dramatic impact. I'm only offering this because you've apparently been able to escape Hell once, do you think you could sneak into Hell?"

You take a stride to the desk and look over the front pages of the bundles.

"Right now you're the leading expert on what you're capable of. Tell me which mission you think you would do best at, based on what you know." Mason finishes.
----

Operation Damned Tears
Oh Lord, Heaven knows,
We belong way down below.
Solid Core has had outstanding success in recovering Magical Girls that Goddess Red has resurrected. We would like to push our luck on this.

You've already made it out of Hell once. Transit back, find where Goddess Grey and the other revived girls are, and set a beacon to allow a team to attack and recover them. This puts you in a position of extreme risk. Marax has a way to track you when you're untransformed and Goddess Grey could kill you in seconds. Success however, would bolster our own forces while denying them to Hell. This is a long shot, but just might be possible with Goddess Gold and Goddess White assisting. Stay out of sight, stay alive.

Anticipated Difficulty: *Points at Goddess Grey* You don't want to know.
Known Allies: You're on your own. Depending on circumstances the beacon might not even be used. Be sure to report on anything notable.
Confirmed Enemies: Hell's garrison, Goddess Grey, Goddess Red, lots of everything else. [Marax]
Possible Combatants: Everything.

[Opportunity: Hunt and kill Marax. This is counterproductive to your stated mission, but will give ~500 EXP and the Ability Retribution Will Follow if completed. He also has stuff you can steal.

Alternatively: Defecting might see Goddess Red revive your mother... ]


Operation Glass Hymn
Di qui non si passa
Logistics is the ball and chain of armored warfare
A child could see that the forces of Light are preparing. Report to Milidia and assist the forces there against the inevitable spoiling attacks.

People that can break trucks with their bare hands? We have thousands. People who can fix trucks in minutes with the same? Summit is in a rarified group. The Fairy-Elf Fortress at Milidia has been under constant attack for years. A talent at repair and construction will make a considerable impact on battles there.

Anticipated Difficulty: Low. If Summit is half as tough as she claims there should be no trouble.
Known Allies: Milidia Garrison (~50 Magical Girls, Elven legions, Fairy army, and Human division.)
Confirmed Enemies: Hell's Seventh Legion.
Possible Combatants: Unknown.

[Opportunities: Lots of things to declare beyond repair and absorb. A semblance of down-time to study, possibly with veteran Magical Girls or Fairy sages.]


Operation Crystal Watcher
There's blood in the streets,
It's up to my ankles.
There's blood in the streets,
It's up to my knees.
The magic that tracks Summit appears to be blood based. There's a respected Fairy sage that knows a great deal about blood magic. She's leading a Suicide Squad, but might find the time to help a subordinate…

Anticipated Difficulty: High. The squad is sure to take deadlier missions with a Magical Girl in their ranks..
Known Allies: Crack Fairy Commandos.
Confirmed Enemies: Unknown. You'll find out when you get there.
Possible Combatants: Unknown.

[Opportunities: Stand atop a mountain of your fallen foes.]


Shadow Carnage
Learn by doing…
It's been less than forty-eight hours since Summit formally joined. Circumstances are exceptional, but it's still prudent to have a training period.

Stick with Carnage, she'll show you the ropes. Expect to be deployed alongside her unless one of you says otherwise. As an aside, we think someone should stay near Carnage anyway….

Anticipated Difficulty: Low-ish.
Known Allies: Carnage, possibly other Magical Girls
Confirmed Enemies: None
Possible Combatants: Unknown. Carnage joked that Solid Core might wake up a lesser Divine Being, but that was just a joke. Right?


+5 EXP Met Magical Girl Brilliant Key
+5 EXP You think you dodged a bullet…
+45 EXP You cannot grasp the true form of Gaia's trick!
+10 EXP A fateful decision.

593 + 65 = 658 Total EXP.

OOC: I'd rather not say how long this took me to write...

 

[kelllogo]

You leaf through each of the folders before setting one down.

"I believe I would be most effective at Milidia. Commander." You answer.

Returning to Hell didn't appeal. At least not the idea of searching for something there. If you had the location of Marax so you could just pop in and keep him from running away like last time….

Between the other options you favored Milidia. You weren't sure how helpful you would be in a fairy group, but being able to fix damaged vehicles and fortifications made you important at Milidia. It made you needed there.

"I'm happy to hear that," Commander Mason replies, "being effective is precisely why you're being sent there. I'll have someone arrange the transfer, you should get instructions just after lunch."

He make a gesture at the entrance, you nod and depart.

As you leave Mason addresses the elves. "I've considered the incident and will take no further action. You may leave."

Curious. You idly wonder what the elven group was there for.

Making your way out of the command tent you stop at the sight of an approaching soldier.

Captain Roberts is walking towards you. The world seems to slow as your attention is drawn to his hair fluttering in the wind, the sharp lines of his face, the tapering muscles of his arms visible at the end of his sleeves.

It's not until he stops a few meters away that you remember what you wanted to say to him.

"You'reVeryCute!" You blurt out.

Your face is turning red. You can see your face become flushed while you're looking at him. Your heart is pounding like a jackhammer and you have the dread sense that you've messed up somehow.

Roberts blinks a couple of times, then lifts his hand to emphasize the papers he's carrying. "Can I get past?" He says in a level voice.

You squeak and bolt away from the door. As you push off the ground to take flight the thought that you've messed things up goes around through your mind. Along with wondering how much you would be panicking if he had… done something else?

These feelings are going nowhere, you resolve to try and stop thinking about it.
----

Repair was one of the notable activities you were to engage in when you reached your new post. When you had fixed the truck it had felt simple, like you could see how it was meant to perform and how to restore it. The element of Discovery combined with the ability to see and work through small gaps sped your efforts greatly, but the truck was much like items you had already assimilated into the Panoply, would novel items be more difficult or impossible?

Finding out would be quickest if you actually tried repairing complex items before someone was counting on it. This was a new ability for you, it needed some examples before you fully understood it.

Thus you make your way back to the vehicle pool once you've calmed down.

Promising to take responsibility for any damage you might cause gets you access to a vehicle with a broken track. After a bit of thought you use the panoply as a jack to tilt it to one side and rebuild the track. It wasn't any more difficult than the truck once you had gotten the relevant part off the ground.

Once a mechanic decided you had fixed it to her satisfaction you were led to a tank and told to repair the transmission/engine unit. This took much longer, you have to refresh your transformation and break for lunch before you're done.

On the whole your new ability is less helpful than it could be. You could sense the problems and feel solutions, but the ideas didn't stick unless you already knew what you were doing. And there was a lot you didn't know about suspensions, engines, magery, and transmissions.

It wasn't all bad, you were pretty sure you could copy from a model to build things. And there was a lot of stuff you had Fused into the Panoply to use as a model.
----

OOC: Level 26 anything with Manufacture is scary
----

After a bit of cleanup you still have no destination to report to. Following an urge to slack for a bit you visit the arcade tent you know about, as per usual it's filled with people on the consoles and electronic instruments. It takes almost six minutes before you've jumped the line enough to get a controller.

The enjoyable diversion lasts for less than fifteen minutes. Apparently there was some sort of tourney for the "Arcade Brawlers 1000" game, but it quickly became "try to beat Summit." Your competitors are already talking about how you play like a computer, but less fair, before they try a 1v3 match against you. By that point you've seen most of the characters and defeat all the others handily, which means all of you are back at the end of the line.

Instead of trying to participate in another competitive game you excuse yourself. Perhaps there's some note at your tent? Even if there isn't that's the first place a message would reach you, right?

This line of reasoning goes out of your head when you see someone you recognize skipping across the path behind you. (Spell, Magic, Legend)

Silver Hero.

It's Silver Hero, she's alive and here, however little sense that makes.

You have to investigate. With a jolt you propel yourself with the Panoply to stalk, er, follow Silver Hero. In no time you are behind her and exclaiming a shaky "excuse me" to the famous Magical Girl.

She lands solidly and spins in place to respond. "Oh? What's going on."

Silver Hero's hair flutters slightly from the rapid turn. Come to think of it was she really Silver Hero? There was probably an explanation that didn't involve coming back to life.

"I don't think I've seen you around before. I'm Magical Girl Summit and thought you were Silver Hero for a moment."

She grins wide. "I am Magical Girl Silver Hero!" With a flourish she flips the book hanging by her side onto one finger, then removes the finger leaving it spinning in the air with rustling pages. "Glad to hear I still look like me!"

It is her! You clutch your hands to your chest and let out a long squeak before you realize it. "That's cool! When I was a new Magical Girl I wanted to be like you!" A stray thought finishes making it's way through your head. "But last I heard you were dead…?"

"I was. There was some kind of brand or something that brought me back to life and made me crazy. But the brand is gone now so…." Silver Hero trails off and blushes, moving her floating book back to her side. "Um, just forget I said all that please? What I meant was that I was on a secret mission. Yeah, totally secret."

She looks around nervously before continuing. "Anyway, I'm happy you think I'm cool! Glad to meet you, Submit!"

She breaks into a run away from you. You wave back for a moment, then resume the trek towards your tent.
----

It was a bit past sunset when you finally got directions where to go. There was a supply dump that was going to deliver carts full of supplies via portals. It was nearly forty miles north, but not too far away from you to reach in time.

The flight there was uneventful. Enough that you wonder about the possibility of bringing a portable video player with you for these sorts of trips.

When you arrive there are already a line of semi trucks moving through a large portal. You land to ask where to go and are directed to just fly through after them.

Drifting after the last truck gives you a bit of time to think. Human dimensional portals were described online as bouncing off of intervening dimensional barriers to make a one jump trip. Did this make them unpleasant? Were there protective spells on the truck cabs to keep the drivers from passing out? Or dying?

In short, you think as the last truck in line makes the passage, is this going to hurt? You grit your teeth right before you touch the pane of light that surrounds the effect.

The transition is instantaneous and nearly unnoticeable. The change in surroundings is nearly overwhelming. Where the sun was down at the supply dump Milidia had its sun hanging low, just over the mountain peaks. Probably morning with your luck.

The trucks are parking in rough lines while dozens of fairies work at levitating the cargo containers off stopped trucks and replacing them with emptied ones. To your left hundreds of Counter Force soldiers and dozens of elves empty pallets from the containers that are set on a concrete base. You fly higher into the air to clear the portal and move to look for the person with the fanciest symbol on their uniform. Picking one who had finished marking a clipboard near a just-emptied container.

"I am Magical Girl Summit. I've just arrived here." You address the soldier.

"Oh, uh." He mumbles for a bit. "Welcome back! I'll get you scanned in in just a moment." He crouches, puts down his clipboard, and takes a bulky scanner from its straps on his leg.

The two of you look blankly at each other for a few seconds. He waves the scanner for a bit before talking again.

"The thing. You need me to scan it so you arriving is noted…." He takes a quick glance around after trailing off.

More seconds pass by before you hit on an idea. You unclip your badge from your hair and dangle it in front of you. The nervous soldier quickly points his scanner at it, relief clear on his face when it gives a few chirps.

"There. You're in, you can go about your day without issue." He says while reattaching the scanner to his leg.

"This is my first time here. Is there something I should be doing?"

He seizes up in the middle of picking his clipboard back up, looking at you with another blank expression.

"Ha! Roy almost managed to talk to a girl." Interjects a different soldier from your left.

You turn to face him. "Can you assist me?"

"Well… since you were flying earlier the simplest directions would be to fly up a bit and go to the stone building with three flagpoles on the roof. That's where the commanders like to stay." He says while slouching a bit on the pallet he was handling. "Saves you the trouble of trying to remember landmarks on this bit of valley, identical cabins and corrugated metal barracks as far as the eye can see."

"That's helpful, thank you."

He shrugs and jogs towards a truck container that has just opened. Stacked pallets of artillery shells are rolled out with half the people watching or assisting.

Everyone here looks busy, and the directions were simple enough. You launch yourself into the sky and pick out the only building with flagpoles on its roof, three flagpoles to be exact. A roar of rushing air follows your passage.
----

You're torn between thinking that the security is quite lax, since you were waved in without the posted guards even looking at your badge, or quite through, as one of the fairy guards (Fire) had used something that looked like opera glasses (Truth) to examine you before you were waved in. More of the latter than the former. You have an odd sense that have been watched even since you flew out of the supply dropoff.

A brief passage through narrow corridors brings you to a large open room. It's about triple the size of the entire command tent at Firebase Momo, but has enough hectic activity that it appears smaller. Tapestries hang on stone walls next to prefabricated desks with all-in-one computers. Two tables on the ground show the valley and surroundings with projected light, another floats a dozen feet in the air where dozens of fairies bustle like a mirror of the activity below them. And on the far side of the room there are a couple of larger desks that have binders stacked on them and people waiting next to them -- clear signs that the officer seated there is an important one. You stride along the ground to join the queue.

It's a very short wait before the people in front of you split to let the seated officer look at you.

"You must be Magical Girl Summit. I am Major General Manners." Manners says as soon as you give her attention.

She's slightly shorter than you, probably just under 160 cm. Her black hair has strands of grey in it and her brow is lightly wrinkled.

The General continues. "Welcome to Milidia Garrison. You are here because we have a critical need for magical repair at our secondary base. The road there is too steep for trucks to cart our largest tanks, which has led to a pile of recovered damaged tanks that can't be sent to Earth for repair. There are more disabled Anti Demon Tanks than active tanks right now." She lets out a brief sigh. "That's where you come in. Is there anything about your methods that changes how we can use those tanks once you've fixed them?"

You don't actually know for sure. You think it's good as new after a bit of effort, but it's still a new ability to you.

"I think it's just like normal repairs? When I fix things it… it's like I see what's wrong and how to right it. It's still new to me." You answer.

Manners taps her knuckles on the desk while thinking. "That's good, but be sure to let someone know if they only work in moonlight or anything else weird." She leans forward a bit. "If you can get fifty Anti Demon Tanks back in fighting shape I will give you a pass for a vacation in Heaven. That's all for now."

The line takes this cue to push itself back in front of you. Someone behind you pushes several sheets of paper at you while clearing his throat. He darts back towards a cluster of desks when you take them.

Reading through them gives answers to most of the questions you wanted to ask. You're staying at some dormitories marked on a map. Achilles Black is in command of the Magical Girl forces. (The dog-eared pamphlet has his rank printed as lieutenant colonel, with the "lieutenant" crossed out. It also points out that addressing him as Commander Black is acceptable.) It even has explanations for model orders, that you are to stay within a certain area unless engaged in combat or other assigned missions and avoid sparring with anyone unless you both have more than 24 hours of official leave. The model orders on the sheet bear no resemblance to the printed orders behind the pamphlet, those being to go wherever you want whenever you want by any method you want and to keep yourself ready for combat. Nothing about repairing tanks is mentioned.

You think the guide pamphlet could have done without the cutesy pictures. Although the one with a chibi sword-wielding Magical Girl cutting a chibi demon commander in half was actually kind of funny, in a macabre sort of way.

Annoyingly you are once again in the position of needing to head somewhere to report in. Hopefully for the last time. You make your way outside and follow the map to reach Commander Black.
----

An impatient flight later brings you to Black's office, a pair of stone cabins that have been joined to make a larger cabin. One of the doors has been covered, leaving a single entrance. You make your way through it.

Inside there's a larger open room with two desks, a wall projector, and a few brightly-colored beanbag chairs in the corner. The larger desk is empty, and a woman goes through a stack of papers with smooth motions. Beside the door there's a poster with a list of "Hero Elements", but instead of listing Magical Girl names it refers to teams. You're not sure who comprises Team ACES HIGH, or Team WOLFRAM, or any of the others. Team REAGENT is listed as being commanded by Magical Girl Arc Mastermind, the only Magical Girl named on the chart, all the other teams are led by captains.

"You must be Summit." The woman at the desk said after putting a sheet of paper into a face-down stack.

You nod. "Is Commander Black in? I was just transferred."

"He's catching up on lost sleep while it's quiet. When you get picked up by a team their leader will let us know. The fighting is enough of-" She trails off as you jerk to the side.

You had taken sudden action because someone with blue hair (Sky, Deception, Myth) had appeared out of nowhere in the corner with the chairs and taken a step towards you. She vanished before you finished turning around. Pulling on the world to make it taut doesn't give the feel of something teleporting, but they may just be subtle.

"A Magical Girl just teleported here and away-" You begin.

"I know. Blue Bandit is trying to make a nuisance of herself." The woman at the desk crosses her arms in front of her and glares at the corner.

The girl from before re-appears from nothing. "How'd you see me?" Without waiting for a reply she continues. "Since you can fly I could use you on a patrol I'm doing soon. Martha, I still have dibs, right?"

Martha opens a desk drawer and starts ruffling through papers with a tired expression.

"I can see all around myself." You explain.

Blue Bandit boggles at you. "Really? That's handy. I don't suppose you teleport too?"

You demonstrate by shifting a couple meters to your left. Blue Bandit's gaze darts between you and where you were standing.

Martha holds a worn-out sheet of paper. "Yes Bandit. You still have 'dibs', if Summit is willing to work with you."

"You're perfect! Floral Glory can also teleport, it fits Team ICETHORN perfectly!" Bandit declares.

You take a moment to think before replying.

Pick One:
[X] Accept Blue Bandit's request.
Join her team in investigating demonic activity. They've been asking for a flying Magical Girl to join them, and you've shown up just in time. (Tactical mission, reveals Doom Counter. More EXP.)
[X] Refuse to join Blue Bandit's group, head to the secondary base to start repairing things.
There are lots of Magical Girls around that can help fighting. You are here because the Counter Force needs you to repair tanks, not to enjoy yourself by slaughtering evil demons... . Well, the General wants you to fix tanks. (Manufacturing actions explained. Extra action available from skipping mission. Blue Bandit thinks less of you.)

+1 EXP Easy tread fix
+3 EXP Fixed a damaged transmission
+10 EXP Dimensional Transit stabilized
+5 EXP Met Magical Girl Blue Bandit
+5 EXP Met Magical Girl Silver Hero
+5 EXP Silver Hero is alive! Somehow
+60 EXP You feel like this took a lot longer than it should have…

658 + 89 = 747 Total EXP

 

[kelllogo]

"I'm willing to work with you." You state after a moment of thought.

You have a feeling she could use your help, it's also a way to be guided around the valley.

"Great! Getting a flier to help out is like pulling teeth sometimes, even when half of them aren't gone." Blue Bandit cheers.

"I'll let Derek know about Summit if you'd like to leave now." The woman at the desk, Martha, said.

"I get it, I get it. Let's go before she puts us on some volunteer list."

With that Blue leaps to the door, opening and passing through in a smooth motion.

"Good luck. And be sure to close the door when you leave, it's chilly this early."

You nod and move to follow Blue, being sure to shut the door behind you.
----

"The trick to navigating is that all the signs face towards the main intersection. The Counter Force signs have latin alphabet, as opposed to the elven signs which…wait a moment. You fly!" Blue lifts up her arms and leaps in place, "Pick me up! I can point out things from the sky."

You pause and blink at her for a moment. She grins and hops again, parts of her costume fluttering in a non-existent breeze.

"Fine," you hang lock you arm around her and form a harness out of the Panoply, "I already know where the dorms are. The building was fairly distinctive."

At first you stay at rooftop level and lower speed, but Blue Bandit shouts of "faster, higher!" give you enough reason to escalate. Holding her off to the side slows your top speed considerably, even so you briefly reach 140 kilometer per hour, Blue's grin growing ever more manic with higher speeds.

The trip doesn't take long once you've put your foot down, and in less than three minutes you've touched down outside the dorms. It was quite distinctive, there were two helicopter pads off to the side, a sheer cliff on the other, and had a small (enchanted) fountain in front of it. You weren't knowledgeable about construction, but it looked like the buildings had been expanded several times. There were wires leading to and from a large shed, a water tank built into the cliff-side, and large glass windows with vertical blinds on the ground floor.

In short, it stands out by looking comfortable and decorated in an expanse of utilitarian buildings.

"Aww, we're here already…."

You let Blue loose, she hops away before gesturing you to follow.

"Back when they first consolidated the MG housing the Elven governor had it expanded and decorated every time a Girl did something heroic. After the third time the brass split up the rooms to look like a hotel and moved in, ...er, I mean they posted a bunch of female officers here as well." She clapped her hands together, "anyways, just remember that Commander Black is the boss, if anybody here tells you to do something stupid just wave your badge at them. Actually you should wave your badge at lots of things, Team CODE put some trackers together and they use these scanning areas to calibrate."

You follow her lead, scanning your badge at the stand just inside, having the kitchen and dining area pointed out, and reaching the gym.

There's a small crowd gathered there. Past a glass wall an angel duels two Magical Girls with wooden swords, no that's not quite it, one girl (Skill, Space, Legend) is dueling against the angel (Light, Hope) and another Magical Girl (Emptiness, Royalty, Legend). You can't see very well with the other five girls pressed against the glass, but the solo girl looks to be winning easily.

Spoiler: Angel Laurence (Dueling)

Spoiler: Angel's Ally ???

Spoiler: ??? Surime?

Spoiler: Angel Abaddon 'Abby' (Sleepy)

On the other side of the room another angel (Light, Hope) with long blonde hair is sitting on the floor leaning against an exercise bike, fast asleep. You doubt that was the intent of the equipment.

"Looks like Abby had a long day," Blue said offhandedly before shouting at the crowd, "Amber! Suit up and get ready, I got a flier for us."

A slender girl with brown hair shoots a pouting look at Blue. "Can't it wait a bit? I want to see how this ends."

The duel looked about ready to end. The girl who was dueling the pair had managed to get the angel, who was three times her size, in a headlock and was alternating between hitting him with the butt of her sword and making quick jabs at the other girl.

"Sumire always wins. Now come on, the sooner we leave the quicker we finish."

Amber made an annoyed moan, but moved to follow Blue.
----

It took almost ten minutes for Blue Bandit to arrange for the helicopter to fly early for her mission. During that time Floral Glory, whose name was apparently Amber, spent the time looking in a mirror and changing the flowers in her hair.

Once embarked on the eerily-quiet helicopter you ask your new companions about Milidia and the current mission.

There are three ground routes out of the volcano where the hellish portal is located. Both of the open ones lead through the main fortress, the eastern route is much narrower. About a week ago another girl closed off the narrow path, apparently with something quite mean and impressive by their expressions. This left them the option of going around the long way through 'Moral High Ground' and its layers of defenses, or charging the wall and forts protecting the main valley.

Both of these were bad options, if demons attacked the short way they would bunch up and be obliterated by Fairy spell teams, trying to go around the long way let the artillery at Moral High Ground decimate them at the layered defenses. But there was a weakness in MHG's fortifications. A hanging valley had a stream running through it, if a force was mustered there it would bypass all but the last wall and be able to attack the weak point where the stream flowed through.

Floral Glory complained that something odd was spotted there twice a week, and that Team ICETHORN was always picked to investigate. Blue Bandit countered that ICETHORN was the best at this sort of thing.

Spoiler: Blue Bandit's hastily scrawled map

----

"Alright ladies, we're at the drop-off site. Do I need to land? Or will you be showing off as usual?"

"Here's fine!" shouted Blue.

She unlatched a hatch and rolled through it into a 20 meter drop, landing on her feet and waving her fist in the air. Floral Glory sighed before leaping down herself.

You don't see the appeal in falling, so you just shift yourself to the ground.

"Normally we'd head south and scramble through that shallow point," Blue points to a pile of rocks that resembles all the other piles of rocks, "but since you're here you can fly us over the summit. That way we won't be expected and can make our early approach faster. Once we're in we'll make observations and I'll decide on tactics. Summit, try to stay behind me for this until I say otherwise, okay?"

Is this why she wanted a flier? To save herself a climb?

You carry the pair according to the apparent leader's directions. Once you've crested the last bit of mountain between you and the valley you get a look inside.

The place is crawling with shadows (Darkness, Chaos), there must be over a thousand of them. Blue hisses once she gets a look.

"Damn. I was hoping it was a couple of critters trying to melt a new tunnel. They've got a shadow generator set up, it hides the real beasties and those shadows can actually hurt us. This is going to take hours."

"Why would it take that long?" You ask.

"Because I've got to crawl around the whole place until I get close enough to the generator to see it." Floral Glory answers.

"That's it. Since we can't tell where the real guys are it's up to Floral here to abuse her invisibility to find the device. We're going to have to set up somewhere while she looks."

There's a flicker of different elements as you look. You can't quite process everything but you have--

Everything stops for a drawn-out instant. When it's past you have swept your attention over every shadow and absorbed the knowledge into sudden clarity. There are 83 Demon Footsoldiers, 24 with large muskets instead of axes, 4 Demon Commanders, and 6 large slow-looking beasties you aren't familiar with. There is also a spot where the ground itself is imbued with Darkness.

That could make this go a lot faster.
----


[X] Save some time by charging in.

You happen to be an expert on this topic, charge in and kill everything. The shadows won't be a problem if you attack on your own, and nothing you've seen can hope to touch you. They did say they were in a hurry… [Magical Girl Instincts approved!]​

-[X] Write in tactics.

You could cut them, or shoot them, or slam into them, or… (defaults to flying and using Laser, starting with the Commanders)​

[X] Point out where you think the Shadow Generator is located.

It's more that you see a spot where it could be hidden, but close enough. Blue Bandit has been calling the shots thus far, there's probably a reason for that.​

-[X] And destroy it.

A short volley of long-range fire should break everything in that area, it won't be quiet though.​

[X] Keep quiet and stick to the plan.

Blue and Floral are more powerful than you, follow their lead.​

+3 EXP Found your lodgings
+5 EXP Found allies
+5 EXP Found your bearings
+10 EXP Saw through obfuscation
Enemy footsoldiers, trying to get a precise count.
23 + 52 = 75 Total EXP

[X] EXP Plan?