"So this is Makai."

If a lull slumped into a conversation, Aya attempted to liven the atmosphere by stating the blindingly obvious.

To which the witch replied, "Uh-huh."

And thus the lull resumed.

Around them, the land took the form of a field of flowers, stretching into an infinite summer's day. But Marisa was determined not to enjoy an instant of it. The sun felt too bright, the grass too smooth, the breeze too soft, the flowers too sweet. Like paint spilled on a blank canvas, it burst with brilliant color, but was a mistake masquerading as a masterpiece—patches of blank canvas slip through. Seams popping in a patchwork illusion.

Altogether, the world tried too hard to look real. So right, it felt wrong.

A sparrow fluttered out of the achingly blue sky to settle on Aya's shoulder. Laughing, Aya reached out to pat its little head. The bird chirped cheerily.

Marisa blew it to oblivion with a Master Spark.

"Be on your guard," Marisa snapped. She brushed scorched feathers from Aya's shirt, while Aya stood stunned. "This isn't our world. And Mima has spies everywhere...even here." The witch fluffed up her pointy hat, perhaps to deter further feathered fiends. "Besides, birds don't really do that. EVER."

Aya grumbled something about "distant cousins," but continued following.

As she trailed after Marisa, Aya rummaged in her shirt for her notebook, but ultimately left it alone. "So what IS Makai, anyway?" she asked, off the cuff and off the record. "I mean, I've heard of it, but..."

"It's a Dream World."

Since the meeting with Ellen, Marisa had sported a fouler mood than usual; foul even for a witch. And to think she'd been so pleased to discuss Aya's stint as a novelist.

"A dream world made by a powerful sorcerer," Marisa continued, voice low. "I met her once, actually. Nice girl; odd, kind of spacey. Not above cutting a deal with Mima, is what I mean. Shiki doesn't care what happens to the world outside, so long as she remains insulated in this comfortable prison of her own creation."

"I know some people like that," Aya remarked. "Mostly artists, musicians. I interviewed the Prismriver Sisters once—gods, was THAT an experience. You wouldn't believe half the weird crap they're into. One time..."

But Marisa displayed no interest. Not in gerbil-dung cigars, alien semaphore messages from eleven-dimensional planet Arcturus IV, or Aya's doomed attempts to lighten the mood.

"Focus," Marisa said. "We're on the warpath, not vacation."

Aya chuckled snidely, but didn't snipe back. Strange. Usually she had a retort ready. What'd happened to her?

The witch. Aya oozed charm and wit, but Marisa sliced through the fog of lukewarm lies with a single razor-sharp stare. Truly a master of deception trusts no one.

While she walked in this strange world, Aya asked herself why she was even here anymore. Sadly, she suffered the debilitating syndrome that caused her private thoughts to dribble into her mouth: "Why am I even here anymore?"

"Because," Marisa said, with the sickly-sweet patience tinged with pity used by adults when addressing an idiot child, "if you go back out into that cave, you're dead. If you get lost in this world, you're dead." She grinned. "Way I see it, unless you stick with me, you're dead no matter what you do."

Even then, the witch's company had proved a less than ideal survival situation. Aya thought on that.

"Who made you an expert? Have you been here before?"

"Yeah." The witch faced the fields and flowers with undisguised disgust. "I had a girl once, came from here."

"Oh, really. Which one?"

Marisa ignored the jab. "THE one. Alice. Soft as silk, sweet as sin. I met her here in Makai, back before...well, we'll say before I was became a law-abiding citizen. I knew all along she was too good for me. Think she knew too, but she never cared about little stuff like that. We hit it off, had a couple happy years together. Then...winter came." She shivered.

Aya stared at her. "Why are you telling me this?"

"It's called 'reaching out,' crow. Don't make me regret it."

Now seemed a splendid time to volunteer information. Aya swallowed.

"I lost friends too," Aya said, "after the Rise. Heh. Funny how it came right after the Fall. You know, the season?"

"Continue."

Drooping, Aya did so. "Once Mima got into power, her crowd put the squeeze on all us news outlets. Had us tweak the tone, forgo objectivity for propaganda-more than usual. After a couple issues of that trash, we lost subscribers. They left in droves, with no one to replace them. Mima's minions aren't exactly renowned for their literary sophistication.

"Soon people started disappearing. My people. Momiji was always too kind, too honest for journalism-she was among the first to go. Then more, then more. I made myself useful so I wouldn't be the next to turn in a deadly pink slip. By then we were barely bigger than a private press. But the paper remained Mima's mouthpiece, her way to shout at the world.

"Not all of us believed the crap our papers spouted, but some went all in-Hatate, for one, welcomed our ghostly overlord. She lives comfortably for it. Meanwhile, me...when I'm not oiling the gears in Her Majesty's propaganda machine, I put out dispatches for the resistance—printed at personal expense—in case there ever come to be enough others who hate Mima as much as I do."

Aya finished. Marisa nodded.

Hazarding a smile, Aya said, "I feel we can understand each other better now."

Marisa looked at her, unblinking. "Don't count on it, kid." She brushed by, bristling.

Finally, a proper retort sprang into Aya's mind, She was about to deploy it, in fact, when she noticed a twinkle in the sky. "What's that?"

Marisa stopped. She saw it too.

Winking in the blue, down tumbled a snowflake. A pinprick in the phantasm, glittering with unearthly fervor.

Marisa put out her hand to catch it.

On a sultry summer's day, standing a in a field of flowers, a witch caught a single falling snowflake.

It melted.

Then the world melted too.

The bright blue heavens peeled away, stripping back to reveal gangrenous black skies. On the wings of darkness, a breath of bitter cold swept the fields. When Aya looked again, the flowers were encased in a crust of ice. The ground smoldered a deep, dead red. Noxious miasma clogged the air, roiling and coiling.

All was deathly still.

"Welcome to the real Makai," Marisa said grimly. "Stay close. Remember, I'm your only way back."

Aya gulped. "Gotcha. I'll do that."

The witch strode onward, ice cracking and crackling underfoot. Aya followed reluctantly. Loath to latch onto Marisa's arm, instead she traced the witch's pointy hat bobbing through the fog.

Soon Marisa stopped, sighed. "This is getting annoying." At the swing of her hand, there blew a gust of wind—the miasma cleared, although briefly. In the distance, over meadows red as a ground cherry, past forests of pure crystal, Aya saw a palace of glass.

A translucent fortress, partly enveloped in miasma: tall, thin towers topped with slender spires; looming curtain walls and boxy turrets; massive gates and tiny shiny windows glittering upon the face of the sheer, sleek crystal walls.

The sight took Aya's breath away.

So did the blue-haired girl in the pink dress, who stood waiting on that red meadow, and the orb of ice currently hurtling from her hand.

An instant after she registered what she just saw, Aya jolted. "Oh sh—Marisa!"

The witch turned. Saw the girl. Swore. Ducked. The ice-ball whizzed past them, then fell and skidded in the frozen flowers.

Smiling enigmatically, the blue-haired girl approached.

"Who are you?" Aya cried out, but immediately realized her mistake. Judging by the witch's drawn face, Marisa knew who she was, and wasn't pleased to see her.

Marisa looked from the corners of her eyes. "Aya," she murmured, "Watch out. There's bound to be an—"

A flash of flame, and a fireball burst by her ear. A ring of flowers thawed, but at their first gasp of Makai's atmosphere, the freed flowers wilted.

Standing sideways, glancing behind and before, Marisa calmly said, "Mai, Yuki. What a pleasure to see you again. It's been so long."

"Liar," hissed a voice. "Not long enough, I say." A girl, yellow-haired and yellow-eyed, stalked out of the miasma, her red dress swishing.

Mai, the girl in pink, stood in front; Yuki, the girl in red, stood behind. A pincer attack.

Continuing with her infamous observational prowess, Aya pointed and declared, "You're WITCHES!"

"So we are," Mai murmured.

Yuki spat, adjusting her dark red hat. "Thought we'd never see YOU again, dropout. Where'd you go after you ran off?"

"Away," Marisa replied, alarmingly calm. "Though, to be honest, I lasted longer than I'd expected. I've never much cared for the company of other witches."

"That so," Yuki leered. She summoned flames in her hand. "Can't imagine why."

"Am I missing something?" Aya whispered to Marisa. "Who ARE these people?"

"Old friends," Marisa replied tightly.

"So?"

"I don't have any old friends. They have a nasty habit of turning into enemies."

"Oh."

Marisa regarded the witches. "Ah, hell with it, I'll ask. Any chance you've seen my old master lately? Can't miss her. Tall, green-haired, kinda ghostly? Sports a sweet pointy hat."

"Her Majesty Mima?" Mai inquired.

"Yep, that's the one," Marisa said, affecting laughter.

"Oh, her." Yuki cackled. "We might've. What's that to you?"

"No games, no tricks. I'd just like to find out where she is, have a chat."

Yuki circled Marisa and Aya, like a panther stalking its prey. "Yeah? You'll have to go through us first, won't you."

"Suppose so," Marisa sighed. "How much is she paying you?"

"Pay?

Yuki snorted; Mai suppressed a giggle. "Pay?"

"There's no pay," Yuki sneered. "We get to keep our lives—that's all we need or want. Oh, and destroy things. You used to love that part. I've been called to the 'real world' for some freelance work, good old-fashioned burning and pillaging. A shrine here, a schoolhouse there, a couple mansions in between...it's a living. Our kind have to find work somehow."

Marisa chuckled. "Ain't that the truth."

The witches stopped circling. They stood in silence.

"How about it?" Yuki said. "You gonna die quietly?"

Marisa tensed. "You know me better than that."

"We thought as much," Mai sighed.

Aya raised a hand. "Um, excuse me, can't we just talk it o-"

An explosion of ice and fire. Marisa spun-wind whipped out at the witches, deflecting their elemental spells. Grabbing Aya, Marisa sprinted for the shelter of the crystalline forest. The other witches pursued, shooting spells.

They reached the trees. Marisa dove behind a gnarled crystal trunk. It shattered at a blast of ice. Her cover blown, Marisa fired a Master Spark as she slunk behind the next tree.

Panicked, Aya unfurled her wings and fluttered into a tree...where she met Mai's eyes. Unfortunately, the witch could fly too. Squalling and squealing, Aya leaped from the tree, chased by flying ice.

"You can't hide!" Yuki cried. Brandishing a whip of fire, Yuki demolished Marisa's latest haven, then dodged the ensuing Master Spark.

"Watch me!" Marisa shot back, both with her retort and a burst of yellow bullets.

Yuki dodged these trivialities without difficulty. "I will too. You can't hide. The trees are CLEAR, moron!"

She had a point. Marisa reconsidered the efficacy of her strategy as she hopped from tree to tree, fired again, missed again. "Good thing we're all such terrible shots, otherwise someone might actually get hurt."

Yuki ground her teeth. The witch stood in the new clearing she'd made with her spells, a circle littered with shattered crystal. Fire in her eyes and literally in her hands, Yuki stormed toward Marisa...

And Marisa summoned a whirlwind.

The gusts swirled around Yuki, stopping her in her tracks, taking off her hat. The wings of wind lifted up the sharp shards...and the crystalline storm lashed out at Yuki, with jingling, tinkling, splintering fury. The witch screamed.

At Marisa's command, the wind abated. Flying shards smashed on the ground or crashed into other trees.

When the crystal dust settled, Yuki tottered amid the shattered shards, her dress torn, her face sliced, her whole body bloody. She pointed a trembling finger at Marisa.

"Dirty trick," she gurgled, "dirty trick..."

"Don't look at me," Marisa said with a shrug, "you did this to yourself. I'm not cruel by nature. You provided me with an opportunity, and it so happens I just don't like you."

"Marisa!"

She whirled around at the sound of her name.

Aya was pinned against a clump of trees, face pressed into the crystal, limbs frozen to the crystalline trunks. Mai's eyes gleamed with cold glee.

Marisa acted at once.

A Master Spark struck Mai in the back. With an agonized cry, the ice witch dropped.

Yuki cried, "Mai!" She ran, and Marisa dropped her, too. Yuki splayed in the carpet of glass, moaning.

Now Marisa aimed at Aya."Hold still." Marisa shot out the ice holding her, and Aya broke free, cold and wet but otherwise intact.

Sighing with relief, Marisa took a step toward Aya...

"Just kidding."

...till a pillar of ice rammed into her chest. Marisa gasped—spittle flew from her lips. She stumbled, cold spreading over her body.

"Don't worry. It won't kill you."

Mai rose to her feet, calmly brushing herself off. "What? You thought a mere tickle would be enough to stop me?" She glanced at the twitching, bleeding figure on the ground. "Her, maybe. But not me."

The crushing cold pressed the breath out of Marisa. She dropped to her knees—shards drove into her kneecaps.

Mai sauntered toward Marisa, relaxed and detached. "Her Majesty is sure to reward me for capturing her favorite student." She ran her fingers through Marisa's clumpy yellow hair. Marisa shuddered at her chilly, clammy touch. Mai cooed in her ear, "Imagine all the ways she'll welcome you back into the fold..."

Aya watched from the edge of the forest, frozen by fear if not by ice. She watched, paralyzed, as Mai's whispered threats reduced Marisa to quivering jelly. She watched, and could not bring herself to look away.

"Pathetic," Mai murmured. She looked up, noticing Aya. "Are you still here? How irritating. Yuki." Mai crunched over and kicked the fallen body. "Yuki, get up. I know you're awake. Come now, we have prey."

The witch twitched. Trembling, she stood, brushing off bits of crystal. She staggered and settled her blazing gaze on Aya.

"Go get her," Mai urged.

Yuki obeyed. She shambled toward Aya, barely able to walk.

"Now," Mai purred, returning her full attention to Marisa, "what shall we do with you?"

Marisa cast a pleading look at Aya. "Lazy idiot...help me..."

But Aya simply stared, horrified.

Lurching, Yuki laid hands on Aya's shoulders. "Le's go," she slurred, lip split, spitting blood. "We got lots to..."

There was a flash of light—Aya snapped her camera. As Yuki staggered, cursing, Aya took off into the forest.

"You fool!" Mai shrilled. Her calm facade shattered like a dropped wineglass. But she settled just as quickly. "No matter. Let her go. She's not important to Her Majesty's plans."

Marisa's ears perked up. "Just so you know," she said slowly, "she bragged about ties to the resistance. I really, really think you should go after her."

"Shut up!" Mai snapped, slapping Marisa. Mai looked to Yuki. "You watch this witch. I'm going after her myself."

"Shouldn't the stronger witch stay with the prisoner? If I weren't me, I wouldn't want me to get away or anything."

"Shut up!" Mai snapped again. "Yuki, new plan. You go, I stay."

The gravely wounded witch slumped. "Eh? But I don't wanna..."

"You WILL go! I'll hex you if I have to. Her Majesty put you under MY command. Go!"

Yuki hesitated. Somewhere in her pain-scarred mind, she wanted to obey, but the rest of her body said, Forget it. She swayed on her feet, threatening to fall.

When her commands weren't obeyed, Mai fired ice. Yuki barely managed to dodge, but retained enough sense to retort with a burst of fire. Mai sprang at her companion, snarling.

And Marisa glimpsed another great opportunity.

While her captors quarreled, she stole away.

Into the forest.

After Aya.


A/N: And THAT, dear readers, is why Marisa Kirisame ranks among the most popular characters out of HUNDREDS. Not just that she's in practically every game, or that she has the most (and best) themes, but because, beneath the prickly exterior and comedic sociopathy, she's got a backbone made of adamantium. The song of her soul would be a never-ending electric guitar solo. Small wonder that (in)famous remix group IOSYS's local guitar god slammed out blistering renditions of her two most famous themes (respectively entitled Sparkling Slash and Nighttime Cruising, now only a YouTube search away). And it...is...glorious.

Releasing late this week, getting back on schedule starting next Monday. Cheers!