They say that magical girls are rather young girls, but what if those girls were able to grow up through their despair and suffering, through their bloodshed and tears, through loss and torture, to face the world without anyone knowing? On very rare occasions, incubators seem to make miscalculations in their judgement. The contracted magical girls, therefore, are able to mature and live through their middle school and high school years. Their stories remain similar, however they are not all the same.
Jami rested her head on the palm of her hand as she gazed through the window of the plane. The view was the same as it had been for the past three hours- clouds and blue sky- but she had nowhere else to look. Nowhere that wasn't other people, anyway.
Every so often the plane would experience the expected turbulence over the mountain range. Other passengers would make comments about how frightening the experience was, and how they hoped the plane wouldn't go down, but this only made Jami roll her eyes. Clearly these people had never been in any real danger: didn't they know the likelihood of death was even greater just driving to the airport?
"Why are you so tense, Jami?"
The voice echoed within her mind like it was her own voice. The incubator sat on her tray-table in front of her, its head tilted just slightly to the side to convey curiosity into her behavior.
"You'd think planes would have gotten more comfortable. Instead you're ass-to-ass with a stranger or two." She responded.
The whirling of the engine and the air conditioners were enough to mask her voice from the headphone wearers beside her.
"Was first class not available? Their accommodations include separated seating."
"Yeah like I'm paying that much," Jami rolled her eyes again. "Took me two jobs just to afford this flight."
"You could have borrowed money-"
Jami flicked the incubator in the face in an attempt to shut it up, continuing to look out the window with a solemn expression.
"You do know you can't behave like this in college."
"I'm fully aware of that fact."
"And if there are other magical girls in the territory-"
"I'm fully aware of everything I will need to do. Please be quiet before I flush you down the plane toilet."
The incubator shrugged and curled up on the tray table. Jami continued to stare out the window in contemplation. In her previous territory, she and two other magical girls divided the land equally and would, on occasion, share the benefits of each kill. It wasn't the perfect setup, sure, but it kept her alive for quite some time. Now, with a new city, she was unsure what to expect. She would be one of the oldest if not the oldest, but she never knew what other magical girls were capable of. It would be best to stay on the defensive for now.
Jami and the incubator exited the plane and waited for the shuttle outside to drive them to her college. The driver attempted to take her bags, but she insisted that she handle them herself. He seemed a little off-put buy the refusal of his offer, and seemed a little off as he drove.
"The drive should only take a half an hour. So keep from annoying me for that long, yeah?" Jami said to the incubator as it curled up in her lap.
The drive was as dull as could be: the highways were packed with rush-hour traffic, the skies were gray with city haze, and there seemed to be absolutely no color anywhere. Jami counted the minutes on her watch. Ten...Fifteen...Twenty...Twenty-nine...Thirty...Forty-five?
"Excuse me, sir, what's our ETA to Rosepath College?"
No response.
"Sir? How much longer will it take to get to the college?"
There was still no response.
Jami set the incubator down and walked up to the front of the shuttle. The man continued staring at the road, eyes wide and slightly glazed over.
"Excuse me, Sir, I said-"
She wasn't able to finish her sentence, instead being thrown into the side of the bus from the momentum of a sudden left turn. Her head hit the folding door by the front of the bus with enough force to crack the glass. Jami shouted at the driver, but realized she was too late when she felt herself become momentarily weightless. The vehicle had driven off the side of the road, and was now flipping over down a canyon. In the singular moment before impact, Jami was able to recognize the glowing red symbol of an hourglass on the driver's neck.
Bracing herself for a horrid impact proved ineffective, as there was nothing more than a small bump and what felt like being attached to a spring. Jami felt the back of her head with the palm of her hand to check the injury. Nothing serious, but something that would ensure headaches in the coming days. She stood up and looked over at the incubator, who was now sitting on the floor of the shuttle.
"I don't believe you will be able to make it to the college unless you defeat this witch."
"Yeah, whatever. You could have warned me that you saw the Witch's Kiss." Jami rolled her eyes and summoned a simple glove, smashing the side of one of the windows.
After crawling through the window, the heavy aura of the scene consumed her. The air was humid and almost sticky to the touch. There was no end to the labyrinth in sight, no barriers, just an infinite amount of webbing extending for as far as the eye could see. The bus itself was suspended and wrapped within one of the webs. Jami sighed and used a scrunchie to put her hair up into a high ponytail.
"I hate humidity. My hair already doesn't like to behave."
"Is the appearance of your hair really that important?" The incubator jumped out of the window and onto her shoulder.
"Not really, I just don't want to show up to the college looking like I just fell into a pool."
A loud hiss from behind her interrupted their conversation. She saw what appeared to be a spider made from red and gold thread, advancing at a somewhat scattered rate. Jami raised her hand and was about to snap to start her transformation when she heard a yell from above her.
A streak of golden light rained down upon the spider and sliced it using a hexagonal pattern. The yellow light cleared to reveal a small teenager. Her light blonde hair was choppy, accompanying her magical girl outfit which showcased hexagons and points at the cape.
"Are you okay, ma'am? Please, don't be alarmed, this will all be okay in a few minutes! Here, would you like to sit down?"
She took Jami's arm and started leading her to the steps of the shuttle.
"No- No! Hey, girl, don't touch me!" Jami pulled her hand away and stepped backwards. "I was about to handle that thing, and, by the way, you put on way too much of a show just then."
"No, it's okay! I'm what's called a magical girl. But you won't remember that, just know that I have everything under control."
"Girl, listen. I am a magical girl! I can handle this. Just stay here and don't use any more magic."
"You are?" The girl seemed confused. "Well, then we can team up, right? It'll be even faster if we do that."
Jami groaned in annoyance and glanced at the incubator on her shoulder. She asked in a low voice, "Do you know this girl?"
"She is a new magical girl to this area. She made her contract about a week ago."
"Oh, they can talk to you, too! I thought I was the only one who can see them."
The girl was still smiling with a pure innocence. It was the kind that Jami had seen time and time again. The eye that wasn't covered with an eyepatch was sparkling with childlike interest and curiosity, and a genuine intent to help others. Oh how she yearned for those days back.
"What's your name?" Jami asked.
"Mira! I'm Mira." She extended her gloved hand to her. "It's nice to meet you."
"I'm Jami. It's nice to meet you, too." Jami shook her hand quickly and let go as soon as possible. "Listen, I liked how quickly you decimated that thing, but that's using up a lot of magic on your part. If you can't be more efficient, just let me take on this witch, okay?"
"We get a grief seed once we're done with the fight, right? I can replenish the magic then. Come on!"
Before Jami could say otherwise, the girl had jumped down to one of the lower webs and was running towards the denser ones.
"How many other magical girls has she interacted with?" Jami asked the incubator.
"She has only seen a magical girl fighting once. She has never spoken with another one before."
Jami decided to play into the girl's childish naivete and follow suit. She snapped and closed her eyes into the blue-colored light's embrace, feeling the soft fabric of her magical girl outfit cover her and the cold metal of the elaborate bow and arrow that she fought with so many times before. The incubator followed Jami to where Mira was.
"I like your costume!" Mira said with a smile. "Blue looks really good on you. Not a lot of people can pull off that really vibrant blue, you know that?"
"Girl, we need to focus on getting this witch over with. I have places I need to be."
"Where do you need to be?"
Jami's incredibly annoyed expression was enough to get a cheerful, childlike laugh out of Mira.
"Okay, okay! I can do melee, I'm guessing by your bow that you can do ranged attacks. Cover me, okay?"
Mira continued to slice her way through the denser webbing with a golden longsword. Jami followed close behind and made sure that they weren't being followed by any creatures other than the incubator. The aforementioned incubator was indeed following, but was advancing much slower than the magical girl duo.
Cold rushed through the pathway as Mira sliced through a foot-diameter web strand. Instead of humid, the air was dry enough to irritate exposed skin. Mira gasped and covered her arms with her gloved hands.
"Jeez, why'd it get so cold?"
"The witch probably likes it that way." Jami said, pushing past her to continue walking in.
Mira followed close behind, though her face turned to intrigue and confusion with Jami's last comment.
"Witch's are that conscious y'think?"
"I don't think that, I know that. Witches make their labyrinths to fit them. Each one's different." Jami stopped walking and put out an arm in front of Mira.
They had reached the end of the pathway that they were following. The rest was a broken slide down into what appeared to be leading the girls into a cocoon made out of the webbing.
"Why'd we stop?" Mira asked.
"It's moving. It's going to come out." Jami responded in a low voice.
The cocoon shook once, then again, then once more before a large screech was heard from inside. Mira covered her ears with her gloved hands, while Jami just winced and tried to stand her ground. A completely spherical creature with eight thin legs emerged from the cocoon. Two rings orbited around the center sphere, almost like rings would surround their planet. The legs seemed to be connected with a single piece of webbing to the base. The sphere contained several star and upside-down moon cutouts.
"Oh, it's small! C'mon!" Mira jumped from the base pathway down to the witch and its cocoon.
Spinning in the air like a wheel, she landed and sliced the cocoon in half with both of her swords. The webbing disintegrated into the ground of the labyrinth, and small, incoherent words were chanted as it was swept away.
Jami stayed at the top of the ledge and aimed an arrow at the center of the witch's base. Mira entered her target range just as her fingers left the bowstring. The arrow narrowly missed the small girl's back, instead grazing her side.
"Don't get in front of-"
Mira wasn't listening. She quickly surrounded the witch in a sprinting circle, slicing off each of the eight legs from the connective webbing. She then moved closer in. The only thing Jami could see was a golden ring around the witch slowly centering in on the target until it was sliced in half horizontally with another screech. The ring stopped and formed back into Mira, who looked up at Jami with a large, toothy grin.
"I did it!"
As she spoke, the legs started to jitter and shake. Each one could be heard giggling and making small crackling noises. Mira quickly darted away as each leg grew into a fully formed version of the witch itself. Jami rolled her eyes and jumped down from the pathway, pushing Mira back.
"Stay back. Just stay back, please!"
Jami ripped the bowstring off of the bow at the bottom point and put her hands to the top of the broken part of the string. A mace formed at the string's broken point, made of silver metal and adorned with spikes that resembled thorns rather than cones with a sharp point. She spun the mace over her head, the string getting longer and longer with each spin.
Using this opportunity to their advantage, the eight copies of the witch darted in different directions around the section of the labyrinth and began to make more cocoons with their webbing.
"Um, Jami?"
No answer.
"Jami?"
Soon eight more copies of the same spider-resembling witch began to swarm the walls of the labyrinth. One lifted a leg towards Mira's corner of the labyrinth and shot out a string of webbing that completely engulfed Mira's legs. It dragged her to the ground and swung her up into the wall, back to the floor, and back up again. Each hit was creating more cracks from the force of impact.
Jami stopped focusing when she heard the cracking sounds and Mira's screams. She swung faster and faster, though she felt webbing start to harden around her legs and free arm as well.
"Mira, cover your neck!"
Mira did as she was told, and, as she was lifted into the air, Jami released her weapon and snapped her fingers. The circle above them that she had created morphed into what looked like a summoning circle, arrows raining down from the entire circle's area. The spiders screeched as they were pummeled with the sharp objects. As an arrow hit their center, each one disintegrated into the ground with their webbing. Mira was left on the ground and Jami fell from her spot in the air.
The older girl ran over to see if the other was alright, only seeing her face-down with her hands covering her neck. She knelt down next to her as the walls of the labyrinth faded into the scenery of the bottom of the canyon. The webbing had absorbed most of the blows from Jami's arrows, but she still had some slashes and scrapes.
"Sorry, kid. I have a first-aid kit in my bag."
Mira looked up as she slowly took her hands from her neck.
"Oh! Is it done?"
"Yeah?" Jami was surprised that she was so casual about the whole thing. "Yeah, it is. Let's find the grief seed and get out of this canyon, okay?"
"Okay!" She jumped to her feet and transformed back into her normal clothes.
This was the first time Jami got to fully examine the girl before her. She was short and skinny, her hair light blonde and choppy like she had cut it herself in front of a bathroom mirror. She had an eyepatch covering her right eye; the eye that was visible was golden and shimmering in the sunset light. She was wearing what looked like a work uniform for a coffee shop or cafe. Instead of wearing her soul gem as a ring on her finger, she wore it as an earring.
Jami left her magical girl form and found the grief seed in one of the cracks in the ground from her arrows. She picked it up and quickly used it, tossing it to Mira.
"Be careful with your magic, okay? You seemed to be using a lot to go that fast."
"Okay." Mira used the grief seed and tossed it back.
The incubator was waiting for them on top of the bus at the bottom of the canyon. It jumped down just in time to catch the grief seed.
"The people in the shuttle aren't hurt, but we should leave in case law enforcement shows up."
"Good idea. You know a way out of here, incubator?" Jami asked.
"I do!" Mira stepped into their conversation, smiling. "I can just carry you and jump up!"
"You're kidding, right? Your solution is to use more magic when you just used a grief seed?" Jami was so confused by this girl's logic.
"It's not that much, J. C'mon!"
Jami sighed and looked to the incubator- not that she was expecting much from its reaction- its face never changed.
"Fine. Just quickly, okay?"
Mira nodded and grabbed Jami, holding her in her arms and jumping up as quick as she could. Jami's eyes widened and she almost glared at Mira in the air. When they landed, Jami retreated back and brushed herself off.
"Who said you could hold me like that?"
"You didn't say not to." Mira laughed. "You're funny, J. You wanted me to come up here quickly and you're criticizing my methods."
"And who said you could call me J?"
"No one. But you didn't say not to, right?" Mira sat down on the sidewalk by the road.
"Please don't call me that."
"How about something else, then? Jami-mi? Mi-mi? Jam?"
"If you call me Jam I will absolutely kill-"
"Jam it is! Aw, that's so cute! I wish I could be called that. That's so cute, you're like blackberry jam, Jam!"
Jami hid her face in her hands and groaned in annoyance. The incubator jumped up onto her shoulder. Without another word, Jami left Mira on the sidewalk and began to walk in the direction towards the college.
"You're leaving her there?"
"Yes. I don't want anything to do with her. She didn't even help back there." She put her hands into her pockets.
"To be fair, you did tell her to stay put."
"Only 'cause she made things worse."
"She could have been rounding them up for you so they didn't multiply away from each other."
"You know what? Shut up. I don't want to hear another word from you tonight."
Jami continued walking for about ten minutes in silence before she stopped on the sidewalk. It was true: she could have been much more helpful if she had just told her to do something that would help her. She had no right to complain if she literally told her to not do anything while Jami's attack was charging. Guilt flooded her system and she looked back in the direction she came from.
She followed the path back to where she had left Mira, but only found an ambulance, a firetruck, and police officers examining and assisting the fallen bus. Jami left the flashing red and blue lights and turned around once more. If the girl wasn't there, then there was no use looking for her elsewhere in the dark.
An hour passed before Jami arrived at her college. She was able to check in and find her room after grabbing a quick bite to eat, sprawling out on her small bed with a groan. There were no sheets, just a mattress.
"Why the groan?"
Jami looked up and stared at the incubator. Had it really not processed the entirety of what went down in the last couple of hours?
"I'm exhausted, annoyed, sleep-deprived, and I spent a couple hundred on a plane ticket."
"You can fix a majority of those problems yourself."
"Didn't I say not to say another word? Zip it or I'll shoot an arrow right into your peanut-sized brain."
The incubator shrugged and curled up on the provided desk. Jami got up from her bed and peered out the window. She could see a few people playing frisbee, a number of people standing around and talking, and even a couple of dogs running around the open field. Perhaps she could have been one of those normal college students in another life- maybe even have had friends to go to college with instead of going out of pure necessity.
Reflecting on these thoughts, Jami set up her bed and plugged every necessary electronic into the outlets on the wall. She gazed up at the ceiling as she reflected on that evening. Mira was certainly a talented fighter, but she used up way too much of her magic in a relatively short amount of time. A familiar isn't even worth your time, much less magic to slice it into a perfect shape! Maybe she could take her in and teach her a more effective way to use her magic…
No! No, what was she thinking? She could never do something like that. Taking an immature child under her wing and trying to teach her would be a complete waste of time, not to mention incredibly annoying and headache-inducing. She cringed at the mere thought of it, but it soon faded as guilt replaced the disgust. Aside from the inefficiency, there really was nothing wrong with how she fought. Jami did tell her not to do anything during the fight with the witch itself.
"The day I associate myself with an annoying kid is the day I die."