"-anks, Aido. Good morning, Yozora! I know it looks overcast now, but the weather report says the clouds should clear around noon and give us a lovely evening! I don't know about you, Aido, but the sunsets in Yozora really are a sight to behold, I tell you what-"
Yamamoto Nao regretted setting her alarm to the radio. Her intention had been to wake up to music, but in the early hours before school it was all talk shows and news. With a tired hand, she clicked the off button on the top of the radio, hand groping next for her glasses and edging them onto her face. She laid in bed for a moment longer, listening to the clink of kitchen sounds drifting in from down the hall. Her pillow was pressed against her face, making her glasses tilt at an awkward angle. She didn't bother to adjust them.
"Nao? Are you up yet?" Her mother called from down the hall, and from the creaking Nao could tell she was standing right in the doorway. There was another creak and the slight sounds of walking as Mrs. Yamamoto went back into the kitchen, speaking softly. Nao pulled the covers up over her face, breathing in the warm, stuffy air underneath her blankets. Slowly, she slid out from under them, until her feet were on the floor, knees buckling as the rest of her followed, magenta hair tangled and mussy and sticking up in several places. With great mental difficulty, Nao stood up and began getting ready for the day.
As much as she disliked waking up in the mornings, she was a fast dresser. When she walked downstairs, her hair was combed, her bangs brushed off to the side like usual and her long pigtails tucked in front of her ears. Her dark pink eyes looked tired, but the bags under her eyes were covered by her usual circular glasses.
"Nao, that sweater is getting old, don't you think?" Her mother said, gesturing at the tan pullover Nao had thrown on over her school uniform as her daughter made her way to the low table and sat down. Nao shrugged, pushing the sleeves up to her elbows and gratefully accepting the miso soup her mother handed her. Mr. Yamamoto looked at Nao over the top of his newspaper, which Nao knew he wasn't really reading. Her father only opened the paper to get wind of sales at the local department store, but teasing from his daughters had caused him to hide his cheap tendencies, especially after he once came home with ten pounds of leeks.
"Pops, that's upside-down," she said, pointing at the paper with a thin finger before she mumbled a quick "let's eat" and began sipping at her miso soup.
Her father turned red and righted it, frowning and spluttering. "I knew that! I was training my eyes. It's not enough to have physical strength, Nao. A person needs a strong mental, um…"
"Focus?" Mrs. Yamamoto prompted, sitting a bowl of miso soup in front of her husband.
"No, it's more…vast."
"Vast? What's that supposed to mean?"
Nao ate the rest of her soup and listened as her parents argued, noticing the ad on the discarded newspaper for 50% Off Saturday and the slight tears around it that suggested her father had lost his scissors. When she was done, she speared a piece of tamagoyaki with her chopsticks and shoved the whole thing in her mouth, standing up and clapping her hands together. "Thank you for the meal!" She mumbled around the food.
Her words shook her parents out of their discussion, and Nao's mother turned to her in surprise.
"You're going already? Isn't it early?"
Nao chewed and swallowed. "Yeah, but I need to pick up paperwork for the club before school," she said, grabbing her school bag and looping the strap around her torso.
"Again with the astronomy," her father said, shaking his head. Nao stepped into the entry way, slipping on her shoes and rolling her eyes, but her father wasn't finished.
"Nao, you could be a judo champion! All those years I trained you…" Nao looked back to see her father's shoulders hunched and shaking, his hands over his face, strangled sobbing noises wracking his body.
"…I'm leaving," Nao said, ignoring her father and reaching to open the door.
"How cruel! Sakura, our daughter is too cruel…" She heard her father say. Mr. Yamamoto clutched at his wife's shirt, and she patted his arm. Nao could almost hear the pity smile in her mom's voice.
"There, there, Tsuyoshi-"
The door slid open before Nao could get her hands on it, and a dark, fast shape swung into view.
"LITTLE SISTER! PREPARE YOURSELF!"
There was a strangled screech, a crash, and then the sound of the nearby picture frames clattering to the ground. When the commotion ended, Nao had her foot squarely planted on the stomach of a young lady with the same shade of maroon hair, although hers was tied up in a bun. The would-be attacker slid down and curled up on the floor, hands wrapped around her abdomen.
"G-good reflexes, little sist…er…" she managed.
Nao lowered her foot and stared down at her.
There was a long moment of silence.
"…I'm leaving now."
Episode 1: "Shining Brightly! Cure Galaxy is born!"
"So, Himawari's back in town?" Kimiko asked, her dark hair falling around her face in ringlets as she painted Nao's nails during class break.
"So it seems," Nao said, head on her desk. She was barely paying attention to her manicure. "I think she got fired again. Wouldn't surprise me."
"Nacchan! That's mean."
Nao propped her head up on her free hand, watching as Kimiko expertly applied a coat of pale pink nail polish to her thumbnail, her blue eyes focused on Nao's hand with laser-like intensity. "It's the truth," she muttered as the door to the classroom opened and the teacher strode in.
Mikage-sensei was a no-nonsense lady who always had her brown hair in a ponytail and wore pantsuits on a regular basis, her lipstick so on point it could kill someone. Today, she walked in with more purpose than usual, holding up her rolled-up lesson book and tapping it against her shoulder like a samurai would his sword. A girl Nao had never seen before walked in after, her mint-green hair tied in two pigtails. She held her schoolbag in front of her body, like a shield.
"Everyone, settle down! I have an announcement." There was a ripple of excitement, and even Kimiko stopped painting Nao's nails and turned to pay attention.
"As of today, a new student will be joining our class. It's already a few months into the year, so make her feel welcome. Can you write your name for us?"
"Of course!" The girl said, tilting her head and smiling beatifically. With a smooth motion, she turned and uncapped a green marker. A few flourishes later, large characters took up a significant portion of the board. "My name is Hoshizawa Himeko! I have lived far away for all my life, but I'm excited to learn more about this city! I have a lot of aspirations and goals! Let's work our hardest! Please take care of me!" She low bowed to the class.
The class clapped, and a few students cheered. Himeko beamed, and Mikage-sensei guided her to a chair two rows down and three to the right of where Nao and Kimiko's seats were.
She talked a lot but didn't really say anything, Nao thought. All we really learned was her name. Nao blew on her drying nails and picked up a pencil as Mikage-sensei erased the new student's name off the board. Nao watched silently and wondered if Kimiko would remember to paint the nails on her other hand.
"The new student seems nice. Hoshizora, right?" Kimiko casually twirled a strand of hair around a finger as she waited for Nao to pack up her things, the final bell chiming in the background. Nao glanced over at the new student, who was surrounded by at least half the class and was laughing with her hand over her mouth demurely. The way she stood and carried herself made Nao wonder where exactly she had lived. It wasn't the normal posture of a high-school girl.
"Hoshizawa, I think." Nao slid her math book into her school bag, snapping the clasps closed with a satisfying click.
"Close enough." Kimiko let go of her hair and moved her hand to scratch her nose, watching as Nao slung her bag over her shoulder. "I thought you had club things today,"
"Nah, I need to find more members. I think you need at least three people before you can turn your paperwork in."
There was a heavy sigh from Kimiko, who crossed her arms, closed her eyes, and hung her head in mock sadness. "This is the last time I'll ever get to walk home with you, isn't it? You'll be leaving me," She said sadly as they made their way out of the classroom.
"Kimi, the club meets once a week. Anyways, if you joined, I'm one person closer to turning this sheet in."
Kiniko wrinkled her nose, blue eyes squinting at Nao. "I know you're really excited, Nacchan, but stars and planets and that stuff – it's not my thing."
Nao sighed dramatically in mock sadness.
"What was I thinking? You're right."
Kimiko looked suspiciously at Nao, who flung one arm over her eyes and sagged her shoulders.
"I can't possibly ask you to take time out of your busy Not-In-a-Club schedule to help a friend out – I mean, it's not like we've been friends since elementary school or anything…" She peeked out from under her arm to see if Kimiko was watching. She was.
Kimiko snorted, crossing her arms and looking away, but Nao looped her arm around Kimiko's and tugged her towards the door. "I'm kidding, you know."
"I know."
"You don't want to join my club because you just got that weird otome game, right?"
Kimiko pursed her lips, her face turning a lovely shade of pink. "The art is really good!" She said, looking around to make sure nobody had heard. Nao laughed the entire way out of the classroom.
Two bright green eyes watched them leave.
The sun was setting on the horizon, bathing everything in a warm orange light. As Nao stepped off the train, she paused a moment to stare at the clouds.
She had said goodbye to Kimiko two stops earlier, and now all that was left was the walk home. Nao's commute was fairly lengthy – a ten minute walk and a thirty minute train ride – but ever since the start of middle school she'd been riding the train, and the commute didn't seem as long anymore. It helped that she had Kimiko to look forward to talking to. It made the time pass by quickly.
There was a sudden flash in the sky, and Nao craned her neck to try to see better. She put a hand up to shield her eyes from the late afternoon glare.
What is that?
From this distance, it looked like birds fighting in mid-air, two dark shapes hitting each other with small flashes every so often. Nao idly wondered if they had found some sort of coin or jewelry. She remembered reading somewhere that crows loved…that…
The shapes were getting closer.
Nao took an involuntary step back as she realized whatever was in the sky was falling quickly towards the ground. She squinted up again, trying to make out what was going on. She thought she saw the silhouette of an arm-
"Look out!"
Before Nao had time to register the shout, something had barreled into her side, hitting her ribs and knocking her off balance, sending her sprawling on the ground in the shadow of the train station. Nao sat up quickly, holding her side and gasping, but before she could yell out, there was a blur and a loud crunch as the dark shapes touched down on land. Nao threw her arms up, squeezing her eyes shut as dust and dirt and small rocks flew up, the shockwave rocking the area. She coughed.
"Princess!"
The same female voice from earlier was crying out again, but it sounded haggard, desperate. Nao couldn't see anything, but she realized it was because her glasses had been knocked off. The world was a mass of blurry shapes. She scrabbled around, fingers closing over the wire frames, and jammed them back on her face.
In front of her stood a bat the size of a small dog, its fur a dark purple in color, a bright bow tied around its neck. It must have sensed Nao staring, because it looked over at her, pink eyes blinking in worry and confusion.
Nao opened her mouth to say something, but it was lost as the clack of heels on pavement drew closer. Nao scooted back, further into the shadows, holding her breath.
A woman was walking towards the fresh crater, her long black hair tied into a thick braid that reached her heels. She was wearing some sort of uniform Nao couldn't place, black and neat and accented with a pale pink. Nao's stomach turned. Something about this woman scared her.
The woman stepped down into the crater, kicking something inside. Something in the crater, a flash of pale mint, bobbed just out of Nao's vision, but slipped back behind the rubble before she got a clear look. With a sick, sudden realization, Nao realized there was someone else in there. The dark shapes she had seen in the sky must have been these two, but there was no way anyone could fall from that height and survive…
People can't fall from the sky.
"Peria, stop!"
The voice again. Nao looked around, expecting a third person to be standing nearby, but all she could see was the small bat, wings outstretched, flying towards the woman.
Bats can't talk.
"Peria! Please stop! Reconsider!"
With a snarl, the woman – Peria – roughly hit the bat out of the sky. Nao scrambled to her feet, running over to the bat and cradling her in her arms. The bat coughed, one eye closed in pain, but she glared at Peria, who just laughed, harsh and low.
"Sorry, Stella. Your power is too low here. Now, if you'll excuse me…" Turning on her heel, Peria made her way to the crater once again, standing over the other person. At this angle, Nao could see her perfectly – a young girl about her age with pale green hair clutching an orb that seemed to be filled with multicolored light. Peria bent down to take it.
A rock hit Peria square in the back, causing her to hiss and spin around, fire in her eyes.
Nao had another rock ready in her hand, arm poised to throw.
Peria's eyes narrowed. "Who are you?" She spat, hands tensing at her sides. Nao fought the wave of fear that was threatening to swallow her up.
"I'm…nobody special," she managed, her voice shaky. She felt like she would fall down at any moment. Her knees were weak, and already she was lowering the rock, holding it tightly in front of her.
Peria's fury seemed to simmer down slightly, but the anger in her eyes didn't disappear. She crossed her arms, considering the situation, and clicked her tongue in annoyance.
"I don't have time to deal with you," she said vaguely, turning back around to face the crater.
It was empty.
"Where is she!?" Peria barked, hands clenching into fists.
"Right here."
Nao turned to look. The girl from the crater was standing unsteadily to the side, looking battered and dirty but defiant.
Peria's head jerked toward the girl, her eyes widening and her mouth cracking into a feral mockery of a smile. "Careful, Cure Star," she said, slowly walking toward the girl. "Your cargo is more precious than your life...but, if you surrender it to me, I might just put in a good word with the boss."
The girl's jaw set, and she raised the orb high over her head.
Peria began running, arm outstretched. "No-!"
Cure Star smashed the orb into the pavement, and the area erupted into a bright, searing light. Nao dropped the rock, threw up her hands, squeezed her eyes shut and turning her head away from the sunburst. She could feel it on her, almost like it was a tangible blanket thrown over her made of polar fleece. It burned red in front of her eyelids, and she didn't dare try to open her eyes until the sensation faded, her vision black behind her eyelids, the soft feeling gone.
Carefully, Nao cracked one eye open, putting her arms down slowly. The glass jar was smashed on the ground, the lights that filled it gone, and the girl and Peria were glaring at each other. Nao dropped to her knees, suddenly tired.
This is a dream.
Cure Star was now struggling to stand up, breathing heavily. "I won't…let you get them. The Starlight Shards are better…better lost than in your hands." She crumpled to the ground, and Nao could see the bright sheen of sweat on her brow.
Peria reached forward, face dark with rage and disappointment.
"Stop!"
Both Cure Star and Peria turned to look at Nao, on her feet, trembling in fear and anger. "I don't know what's going on, but leave her alone!" She said, pointing at Peria, hand shaking.
Cure Star finally registered the third human nearby. Her face turned paler. "Get away!" She yelled, waving her hand at Nao. "It's dangerous!"
"But-!" Nao began, stepping forward.
This is a dream, isn't it?
"I want to help," she said, almost a whisper.
Please tell me this is just a dream.
Peria snorted, eyes hard. "Run away, little girl. This isn't your fight."
Nao took another step forward, and another. "I'm making it my fight."
She can't do anything to me inside my head.
The sudden noise of clattering on the ground made both Peria and Nao look down in confusion. Something was rolling towards Nao, coming to a halt as it hit the side of her shoe. Nao crouched, placing Stella on the ground, and picked up the mysterious object, a small star that fit perfectly in her palm. She stared at it in confusion, turning it over. It was simple and pink, made out of a material Nao didn't recognize. It radiated heat, and Nao instinctively closed her fingers around it. It made the situation seem realer somehow, like a lens that threw everything into sharp focus.
"Princess…are you sure?" Stella said, less mesmerized by the mirror than Nao. She had already begun to hop over to Cure Star. Peria was staring at the mirror in confusion.
"Quickly!" Cure Star yelled, snapping Nao out of her reverie. "Hold it up! Hold it up above your head!"
Blankly, hesitantly, Nao did so.
She closed her eyes.
A wind began picking up, tugging at Nao's clothing. Peria took an uneasy step back, her face tight and anxious.
There were…words, drifting through Nao's mind, catching in her mouth and…she had the feeling she needed to say them, to speak them out loud. She took a deep breath in.
"Pretty Cure! Cosmos Activate!"
The effect was instantaneous.
Nao brought the mirror down and clasped it against her chest, barely registering the fact her body had begun to glow pale pink, her glasses dissolving away. Her body felt heavy, and as she opened her eyes (the irises being a lighter pink than was her usual color), she shook her arms roughly, the glow melting off in a shower of sparks and leaving pink gloves in its stead. Nao spun once, feeling her body becoming lighter as the glow dissipated to reveal a dress edged with lace, and she clicked her heels together, revealing boots that went to her knees. She tapped the mirror lightly once more, noticing it had attached to her dress, and the sudden motion shocked a pink choker into existence around her neck, as well as ribbons that trailed delicately from the mirror and earrings that clinked against her cheeks pleasantly. The glow had now begun to concentrate around her hair, and Nao shook her head once, feeling it become lighter, and ran her hands through her hair, feeling it grow underneath her fingers and coil itself into two pale pink pigtails that fell to her waist in spirals. Nao felt like she was floating.
More words rose in her mind.
"The promise of infinite possibility! I am Cure Galaxy!" She yelled, bringing her arms up in front of her in a defiant pose.
Then Cure Galaxy's brain finally caught up with her mouth and body, everything crashing down back to Earth and reality in a split second.
"Wait…wh..at is…" She mumbled, confusion heavy on her features. She looked at her hands, down at her dress, pulled at a pigtail gently to make sure it was real. Her hands went to her face, but her glasses had disappeared. The transformation couldn't have taken more than a second, but in that time, Nao had transformed into a completely different person, someone with perfect vision. Cure…? Promise of…? What am I saying? Cure Galaxy thought, turning this way and that to get a better look at the sudden costume.
Peria had retreated, face dark with fury.
"This isn't over, Princess," she spat, turning to look at Cure Galaxy with the coldest eyes she had ever seen, and behind Peria a dark void appeared. She stepped backwards into it, so that the last thing Cure Galaxy saw were pink eyes, shining with hate. Then she and the void disappeared, curling up toward the sky like smoke.
Cure Galaxy stared after them for a moment, turning her attention next to the ruined street –
But as she looked, the debris faded, the rubble and crater vanishing, leaving the empty street as it had been the moment before the battle.
'What! It's gone?" Cure Galaxy said, staring at it in disbelief.
"Singularity disrupts space and time whenever they appear," Cure Star said, struggling to her feet. Galaxy ran over to her, hands outstretched to catch her in case she fell, but Star waved her away. "I may have lost the fight, but I'm not dead yet!" She said, smiling weakly.
"Please don't make those jokes, Princess," Stella said, perched on Star's shoulder and putting a small paw on her face. "We should be very lucky Peria didn't decide to continue fighting. We're in no condition to-"
"Yes, yes, all right, Stella. I got it." Star nudged the broken shards of the orb near her feet thoughtfully. It hadn't shattered like glass, but looked more like melted plastic. Whatever was held inside the orb was long gone. There was a sudden, pale green light, and in a moment, Cure Star no longer stood there, but someone Galaxy had seen before just hours ago.
"You…you're…Hoshizawa?!" Galaxy spluttered, feeling the familiar thick cotton of her school uniform and her scratchy, old sweater against her arms, the thick round frames of her glasses winking into existence on her face once more. She adjusted them out of habit.
"Hoshizawa Himeko, at your service!" Himeko curtsied, her twin pigtails bobbing as she inclined her head. "And this is Stella, my loyal bodyguard! But, before we go further…" Himeko tapped a thin finger against her chin.
"Why are only half of your nails painted? Is that fashionable here on Earth?"
Nao gaped at her.
Someone…please tell me this is a dream…
Things like this don't happen to someone ordinary, right?!
Next Time on Starlight Pretty Cure!
Nao: So I've become a… Pretty Cure?
Himeko: That's right!
Nao: And I have to save the world?
Himeko: No, the universe!
Nao: But, Himeko, before that…
Himeko: What?
Nao: What was our homework in class?
Himeko: Are you serious?!
Next time on Starlight Pretty Cure: "The Universe in Danger? I'll Help the Princess!"