Author's Note - If you want to see this chapter with the awesome illustration I commissioned from Ryuucaro ( .com), check it out on Ao3!

Chapter 10 - Rescue Mission

Memory – The World of Roach

Roach had never had so many guests at her homestead before. (Four! Madness!) It made her a little twitchy, but they looked after themselves and gave her plenty of space. Even Bear's friend from the west, a slender young man with spiky orange hair and striking, ice-green eyes, followed the rules. "Breeze is a nasty little scoundrel," Bear had said affectionately. "But he'll behave. I think you two will get along!"

So far, they'd only awkwardly made eye contact across gatherings and politely ignored each other. Sometimes he took part in Charmer's declamations, challenging her in a clear, sweet countertenor when the stories called for separate voices to play rogues or villains. He seemed nice enough, but Roach couldn't imagine what he must've done to make Bear call him a nasty anything.

The five were gathered to observe a somber occasion: the anniversary of the Catastrophe. It was a grotesque mirror of a holiday; instead of gathering to make merry, communities pulled together because it was a bad time for anyone to be alone. There hadn't yet been time for any traditions to take hold, but everyone seemed to agree that it should be marked somehow. Charmer had offered to declaim The Fall of the Southern Cross, which would either be cathartic or a depressing mess. Roach had agreed to host, and here they were.

Nobody looked like themselves that day. Snake wore capris with a pale pink blouse that matched her hair, a far cry from the fearsome bodyguard. Breeze had donned a sharp suit instead of his usual jeans and boots. Bear apparently owned a sundress; seeing her in anything but an exorcist's habit was surreal. And Charmer still wore her familiar Declaimer's robe, but had gone without her bandages today, exposing the stump of her right arm and jagged burn scars down the side of her face, though she'd kept her eyepatch.

Roach would have expected more of a reaction from the others, or even herself, but none seemed to be coming. In retrospect, noticing a scar or injury might be startling, but it was just a fact of life and a part of someone's body. You couldn't go treating people like they were repulsive, so you got used to the sight.

"Are we ready?" Charmer asked, pocketing her glasses.

They weren't, but how could you prepare to witness the end of the world?

Charmer's song summoned the image of a towering woman, cape rippling in the wind, wavy bangs falling over blank goggles, rendered in the harsh red light of the exposed leylines. Some Declaimers gave her spiked pauldrons or a gruesome mask, but Charmer always stuck to known details. She told them of the magic that had once lived in the world's bones, and how it had faded, and the Southern Cross's mad quest to reawaken it. They watched as she gathered allies, conquered foes, uncovered secrets, and overcame incredible odds to carry out the experiment that killed the world.

When she reached the Catastrophe, Charmer let her images dissolve. Nobody needed to see that again. Instead, she accepted a steadying hand from Snake and rose to start the most important part of the story – everyone in the circle would get the chance to tell of where they were, and what had happened to them.

"I don't remember much," Charmer said. "People tell me I was trying to help the fairies, and I hope that's right, but it's all…" She waved her hand helplessly. "…just light and colors. One moment I was singing for the Fae Conclave on a beautiful summer day, the next I woke up in Snake's lean-to and half of me was gone." She smiled ruefully. "I… didn't take it very well, but Snake was very patient with me. Don't let her fool you! But that's me."

Snake mouthed very patient with an appalled look, and Roach couldn't help but agree. It was awful hearing Charmer being so glib and dismissive, but what were they going to do, tell her to be more upset?

"I was on the road," Snake said. "I saw the leylines tear into the sky from a long way off. First, I was curious and wanted to get closer, then I was smarter and wanted to stay away, then I finally realized there was nowhere to go anymore. I thought about it, and picked out a nice field that wasn't too burnt up, and…" Snake trailed off with a frustrated sigh. She got a little further each time, but this wasn't the day. "Uh… it's a good thing I found Charmer when I did. And if you want to call that 'patient,' sure."

As Snake sat and Charmer took her hand, Breeze got up and set a foot on his seat like Captain Morgan. He always told stories as a boast, no matter what happened in them or if they were even about him.

"I was in the Victoria and Albert Museum. A ley line ripped right up through the building – almost took my nose off, it was so close – then the whole damn place fell on me!" Breeze brought his hands down with a laugh. "Whoomf! Want to know something funny, though? I was just casing the place, but I'd grabbed this neat Parisian pearl necklace. I somehow kept my grip on it all the while I was crawling out of the rubble. And then, when I got out and saw what a mess everything was, I just dropped it on the ground. Kind of wish I hadn't, now! It'd be nice to have something from that day."

The rotation had come around to Roach. Charmer glanced up to her politely, but they all knew she never took part in responses.

"I was," Roach blurted, popping to her feet, and everyone jolted. It was almost enough to push her voice back down her throat, but she drew a shaky breath and continued. "Already scavenging. Already alone. The sky turned red; I didn't know why. I kept working. In a – in a way, nothing changed. Is that awful?" She sat down and lowered her head. It was poor form to end with a question, since nobody could answer, but that's what had bubbled up.

"I was off to the east," Bear said, rising without missing a beat. "Working a nonsense job in a town called Veliky Ustyug. There wasn't much damage from the ley lines, at first. We didn't know they were poisoning us. The demons were the real problem, back then, but I helped with that. I wish we'd figured it all out sooner."

Bear's story always ended awkwardly because the Catastrophe had blended smoothly into her new life as an exorcist, and she never knew how long to go on.

"And so," Charmer called in a relaxed voice, half-singing, and finished the story from her seat. Every Declaimer ended The Fall of the Southern Cross differently, but Charmer never gave the woman much more focus. That ominous red figure shrank and faded as she marched into the distance, disappearing into a pyramid she'd raised from the Earth. And after that, who cared? They all had more important things to do.

The spirits were more eager as Charmer called up images of Roach's fields, the ruins that Breeze explored to find tools and resources for his community, the lonely roads that Bear hunted demons over, and the lumbering crawler that carried Snake and Charmer between their various jobs. The display buoyed Roach, but also left her bone-tired. They had a moment to rest now, and it'd be back to work tomorrow.

"World reconstruction is a bigger job than any one of us," Charmer said as the spirits rippled and subsided into the poisoned ground. "But we're all here. I don't have a stylish end to this story because it isn't over… I just want to thank you for looking after each other. We have all the skills we need, the strong hands and sharp minds and stout hearts. Our task may never end, but as long as we're there for each other, how can we fail?"

With that, she curled up in the grass and fell asleep.

"So, uh, the end?" Breeze asked, befuddled.

"I swear, she thinks this stunt is cute or something…" Snake grumbled, carefully scooping Charmer up. "Class dismissed, everyone. We'll do accolades later."

Luna Nova

World reconstruction. That awkward phrase felt familiar to Constanze, but she couldn't place it. She'd heard it at Luna Nova, but when? She slapped her forehead a few times and tried to drag herself into the present. She didn't have a headache, even though she hadn't taken the interface headset off since the briefing. Having Diana in the system made it gentler, somehow – like being pressed up alongside a warm body, rather than caught in a machine's gears.

The workshop monitors displayed different views from the New Moon Tower's security system, focusing on the brooms racing up the ruined elevator shaft and the ghostly girl waiting for them. It had been bad enough when she thought they were just going to challenge an adult witch in her lair, but the connection to the Catastrophe turned her nervousness into steady, low-key terror. Croix Meridies… Croix du Sud… the Southern Cross! What is she doing up there?

They couldn't hear one another's thoughts, thankfully, but Constanze could still sense Diana regarding her with mild concern. Emotions came through the link clearly, for some reason. She hadn't expected to find so many beneath Diana's cool surface, nor within herself now that the link was there to make her self-conscious about them. What a mess!

This is a different world, she reminded herself. The ley lines are different. Croix may have killed Roach's world, but she can't do it here.

Probably. Hopefully? What could Croix even do that would end the world?

Constanze didn't know what to tell the others. She hadn't even mentioned the Southern Cross to Wangari. Was she being irresponsible by not warning them, or would she be scaring them for no reason? It wouldn't have even been a question if not for her mistake with the demon…

"There you are!" Barbara called as the witches approached. "About time!"

Hannah and Amanda landed side-by-side in textbook passenger landings and Hannah immediately ran to her girlfriend. "What are you doing here? Aren't we twenty meters into the Kill-Barbara Radius?"

"I wanted to see what Callistis was up to!"

"So you followed her back up the tower, after what happened?" Hannah's eyes flicked up and down her girlfriend, confirming that she was whole. "You really are a fool."

"Nice callback! A-minus!" Barbara's voice mellowed. "But the canopy's fine, see? I'm not planning on burning away."

"What's wrong?" Amanda asked. "There some kind of radiation we should be worried about?"

As Hannah and Barbara explained, Constanze donned a gas mask and rushed through two sealed doors into the deepest room of her workshop. Pain tickled at her temples with every command as she set the stanbots preparing a vat of industrial solvent and dunking one of the salvaged magic-blocking panels in a thick cloud of toxic steam. The stanbot posted with Constanze's wand called, "MS. BARBARA: RETURN TO THE GROUND FLOOR. A STANBOT WILL DELIVER AID SHORTLY."

"With pleasure," Barbara replied. Conz flinched in surprise; she was hearing the response through Diana's ears instead of the stanbots' tinny receptors. Best not to think about it too hard. "My arm is getting tired!"

"Stay safe, Barb," Hannah said. Constanze couldn't see what was happening, but she was getting Diana's impression of it. It was like having a strangely mundane dream.

Barbara started to reply, lips quirked for a breezy joke, then went in for a kiss on the cheek instead. "You're the one going into danger," she said gently. "Take care of Diana for me. I'll be back as soon as I can."

Hannah bit her lip and nodded.

"What's this, are you…?"

"No, it's okay. I'm fine." Hannah lied. "It's just that… this could be the last time I see you before the other me has to go home. Which means…" Her eyes snapped past Barbara and her lip curled. "Oh, pull yourself together, Kagari. You're not even involved in this!"

Akko, who had been watching the scene with a death grip on Amanda's arm and fat tears glistening in her eyes, turned away and crossed her arms in a pout. Constanze noted Diana's heart getting heavier, too, but she was doing a much better job of holding it in. The sting of sympathy towards Akko was a surprise, though.

"You always feel better after making Akko cry, right?" Barbara asked, elbowing Hannah.

"Oh, get out of the death radiation, already," Hannah replied with a tired smile.

Akko flipped them off with both hands and resumed pouting.

Constanze filled a second vat with filtered water and hung a heavy robe over the first. The solution would just need a few more minutes to settle and she'd be able to infuse the robe with magic-blocking particles, hopefully making a convenient shield for Barbara. It felt like a primitive answer, but they were on a time budget. When she got back to her chair, she saw that Diana had changed one of the monitors to read: Do you have something to tell us?

Her first impulse was to deny, but the question annoyed Constanze enough to take perverse glee in typing Croix might end the world and kill us all. Constanze Bar saw it happen. She felt Diana's sudden fear and confusion, and realized how cruel it was to drop that on her without warning. But she might not, Conz added guiltily. Different world. Different Croix.

"Diana, hey, are you okay?" Akko asked, and both Diana and Constanze snapped out of their conversation.

"Of-of course," Diana said. Tell me more when we're underway.

"Then let's get moving, already!" Amanda said, thrusting her broom as though calling a charge.

The four stepped through the ruined security door in a rough line, passing into the stale, electric air of the 6-dimensional labyrinth. Almost immediately, dark spots appeared in the air around them, like space itself was growing mold, and a few pixels dropped out. Hannah and Amanda wasted no time in mowing them down with their wands, and even Akko swiped one from the air as it raced past her.

"They weren't going for us," Hannah said. "Did you see that? They were all aiming at…"

The others turned to Diana.

"Ah, as Constanze suspected," she said. "The security system automatically generates defenders to harry us without intervention from Croix. It may be fixating on me because I'm partially magitronic; we observed that, from the security sensors' perspective, I'm a beacon. I may be endangering you more by accompanying you."

"What do we do, then?" Akko asked. "We can just keep swatting 'em, right? That was easy!"

"It may not remain so. Perhaps I could take a different route, thereby drawing the security system's attention away from you?"

"And not alone, obviously," Hannah added.

Diana looked to her in surprise. "I didn't…"

"Look, Barb said to take care of you. I'm not gonna let her down."

"Okay, that's enough mushy crap!" Amanda said. "Show me the map again?"

Diana held out her hand and a hologram depicting the labyrinth's layout appeared over it. A red line through it showed Callistis's route as she fought her way through the heaviest security, and a blue line suggested the most efficient route. Callistis hadn't been too far off, but it wouldn't be hard to catch up to her on a broom.

Amanda waved her wand through the hologram and then tapped the metal bracket at the top of her broom, summoning a green arrow over it. "C'mon, Akko! Let's blow this popsicle stand!"

Constanze started to type her explanation in as Amanda and Akko took off but realized that something was making Diana was nervous. Need a moment? she asked instead, and was gratified by the spike of irritation shooting through Diana. Payback! Taking that as an answer, Constanze started to relay what little she knew of her world's doom.

Examination Room 12 had become Operating Room 1. Lotte slept peacefully on a proper bed, surrounded by floating metal rings that monitored her vital signs and regulated the flow of energy through her body and out to the Noir Rod prototype. Despite the eerie feeling that it was watching them, the Claiomh Solais didn't seem to object to its part, obediently hovering above its stand and making the Noir Rod's clumsier functions safer and more efficient. The operation was going as smoothly as Croix could have hoped.

It was going so smoothly, in fact, that she could spare some attention for the magical war raging downstairs. Her guests were advancing in three groups, none of which were having trouble with the defenses. As expected, Chariot took the lead, barely slowing as she smashed through giant statues and raked loose pixels from the air. She'd be a significant problem even without the four witches following in her wake.

"Maybe I should be getting worried," Croix said idly.

"Maybe you should be terrified," a dry, nasal voice suggested behind her.

Croix sidestepped and her 20-kilo office chair crashed through the console in a blast of smoke and sparks. Her cape flew wide as she spun and scarlet forcefields slashed the room into chunks – the security system reacting to sudden damage, having failed to detect the cloaked figure in the center of the room. It was wreathed in unnatural shadows that lashed all over the room with every slight motion, and glared at her with blazing eyes. With a red forcefield between them, Croix didn't get the full effect.

I should have pumped Lotte for information on the others, she realized. I have no idea what's coming!

Seeing her expression, the apparition broke into a grin. "That's more like it."

Croix raised her hands towards the ceiling. Two columns of pixels slipped down, coiled around her forearms, and formed bracers that held obsidian lenses over her palms. With a flick of her wrists, malevolent red light crackled to life within them. "I don't want to hurt you," she said. "So why don't we talk this out?"

"Oh, don't worry about that," the intruder said, and sank into the floor. Her voice floated out of the shadows all around. "I want to see if you can do anything to me."

Croix paced in a slow circle, lenses at the ready. The contrast between light and dark slowly grew, turning the floor into a maze of stark black shadows from every light strip. "If we're being curious, then… just what are you?"

The intruder leapt from the darkness three feet from her face. Croix loosed a stuttering volley of stun bolts from both lenses, but they passed into the shadows on the creature's body and vanished in the distance far beyond her. She was solid enough as they collided, unfortunately, and the stone floor was even harder. Thin hands gripped her wrists, unnaturally strong, and a knee pressed painfully into her belly.

"What, indeed?" the intruder asked, fangs glistening.

"Is that… you, Sucy?" Croix asked. She squinted into the darkness and asked with more confidence, "Sucy Manbavaran?"

"Half," Sucy confirmed, then casually stood and stepped back. "And half someone else. Speaking of being half a person, now that we know I could easily rip you in two, why don't you let Lotte go?"

Croix sat up slowly and pulled her goggles down. A heads-up display sprang to life and reported… nothing useful. The lab's sensors still had no idea that Sucy existed. However, one set was starting to get a grip on the blob of shadow surrounding her, noting the change in temperature and a dip in ambient magic.

"Okay," Croix said slowly, miming a bad back as she rose. "Ungh, ow. Just give me a moment."

"I saw that you made a bond with Lotte," Sucy added. "It's still there. What did you do?"

"You saw what?" Croix asked blankly. "Ah, all I did was convince her to help me. She agreed to protect Akko from the Shiny Rod's tests."

Glowing eyes narrowed. "You're lying."

Croix grimaced. "No. For once, I'm not. Why is it that the one time I'm not being duplicitous, nobody believes me?"

"Because that's not how Lotte works," Sucy insisted. "She wouldn't take that away from Akko. It's obvious the tests are helping her be less of a dumbass, and what about saving Vajarois?" She dove through the shadows to bob up alongside the bed, but wisely didn't get too close. "Lotte's the kind of girl who supports the people she admires from the sidelines. She wouldn't want to replace Akko in her job, she'd want to find a way to help her!"

Sucy can't go through my force fields, Croix noted, and changed the settings on her left lens with a few flicks of her fingers. "Half of her is that kind of girl, maybe," Croix conceded. "But did you consider that the other half might have a different relationship with Akko?"

"Then that other half is making my Lotte do something she'd never!"

"If you're thinking like that, then you can't trust any decision you make, can you? How do you know the vampire, or whatever she is, isn't making you do things you'd hate?"

"You—!" Sucy started, baring her teeth, then smiled. "Oh. You're trying to keep me talking, aren't you? Clever."

There. Croix's HUD finally had something to report. The "shadow" following this weird little monster around was a cloud of microscopic particles similar to her patented magic-blocking alloy. What was it that Hannah said? "It must be the Stone, like with Sucy?" Another twitch of her fingers changed the settings of her right lens.

"Okay, time's up," Sucy said, pulling a bottle from her sleeve. "Let Lotte go right now, or we're finding out how much of this you can drink before you puke up your kidneys."

"Counteroffer," Croix said, raising her right lens and dismissing the forcefield between them with a gesture from her free hand. "I have my computers working on a ritual to separate you out when Lotte and I are done. Come back in the morning, and…"

Sucy lunged and a silent beam sheared a third of her shade away, exposing a perfectly ordinary arm and a dress that didn't flow or ripple ominously at all – and then an explosion of green flame. She shrieked and dove like a comet, but the green glow persisted, racing across the floor. Croix had an instant to point her left lens down and project a forcefield groundward before a pale hand slammed into it from below. She tracked the forcefield around as Sucy circled beneath her like a shark, then retreated.

Sucy sprang up in the far segment of the room and landed on the Shiny Rod's stand like a gargoyle. Smoke rose thickly from her arm and the left side of her face; the glow cutting through it was much bigger than her right eye. Nothing in her bearing or expression suggested pain, only cold anger.

Croix lowered her hands, staring in horror. I did that? Oh no…

"You're going to suffer," Sucy said flatly. "Not now. Maybe not even soon. But I'm going to make you suffer for this. Look forward to it."

She probably would have caught Croix flat-footed if she'd attacked, but instead she snatched the Shiny Rod and retreated with it. Croix was left panting and uncertain. I just hurt a student. She let the lenses crumble from her wrists and patter to the ground. By the Nine, what the hell was I thinking? It's like I saw a problem, and then everything else blinked away while I figured out a solution. Why do I keep doing that?

The remaining forcefields deactivated and rearranged themselves. "Accept new settings?" a computer voice asked, and Croix responded with a distracted grunt. The new forcefields reinforced the walls, floor, and ceiling, which would hopefully keep Sucy from visiting again.

Once it was safe to move about the room, Croix carefully checked Lotte's vital signs. Still out like a light, but her heartrate's a little high. If this is putting stress on her, I don't want it to go on too long. But how can I… ah! With a few expert swipes on her tablet, she called up a pair of pie charts side-by-side. One showed the proportions of emotional energy that she was drawing from Lottes across the multiverse, grouped into broad color-coded categories like "anger," "fear," and "joy," while the other showed the magical energy conversion rate for each emotion.

Their target was still a long way off.

Most of the emotional energy coming in was green anxiety, with yellow joy in second. Poor thing, Croix mused. Why are they all so scared? Meanwhile, the other chart reported that joy was also second in conversion rate, with red anger giving the best emotion-to-magic ratio. Guess I was wrong about that. If I were still doing my old scheme, anger would've been a lot easier to work with…

After some quick math, Croix instructed the Noir Rod to ignore worlds that offered less efficient emotions and focus on drawing anger and joy in particular. The rainbow stream of light overhead turned into a double helix of red and gold. Focusing on anger would limit the amount of emotional energy they had to channel through Lotte, while allowing joy would keep the process from taking too long. Sure enough, the rate of magical energy conversion quadrupled, and Lotte's heartrate evened out.

Croix gazed up at the twisting streams and, for an uneasy moment, wondered what kind of "personality" she was giving the Noir Rod. Like the Claiomh Solais, it was arguably alive, and its actions would reflect the emotions that had gone into it. But then, it was purpose built – maybe it would be a little bloodthirsty in breaking the Grand Triskelion's seal, but that was all it would know how to do. She could deactivate it if it got out of hand, anyway.

The important thing is that Lotte's safer, Croix decided. Feeling a little more virtuous, she set about shoring up her defenses for Chariot's arrival.

"Man, Callistis is a beast," Amanda cried as they raced along the labyrinth's dim ways. So far, they hadn't encountered anything to use their new weapons on, just empty halls and fields of shattered statuary. "Who would've guessed?"

"I had a feeling," Akko muttered. "But I don't wanna talk about it."

"Okay, but so you know, I'm picturing her teaching you Shaolin Kung Fu now. Oop." She swerved and shot a pixel from the air with a poke of her wand. "Also, can we try the Darius thing again?"

"Sure, Darius."

"Yeah, see, sometimes that feels really good! Isn't that weird? Just being called differently shouldn't change that much, right?"

"There are all kinds of people out there," Akko said, warming to the topic. "I dunno if being a boy sometimes is that weird. And you want people to treat you like who you are, right?"

"Right. Y'know, we were on our way to the tunnel last time I felt like Darius. Do you think it's going into battle that makes me feel dudely?" Darius asked. "Ugh, I hope it's not that stereotypical."

"We were flying together, too," Akko pointed out playfully. "Maybe it's having a cute girl hugged up to you that does it?"

"Huh, maybe."

Akko's laugh cut off. She'd been expecting more pushback on the 'cute' part. Before she could think of a response, though, something plunged out of the ceiling in their path, a great dark drop, and spread before them like a bat's wings. She clutched onto Darius as he swung in a tight turn and brought his wand up, crackling with an attack spell. "No, don't!" Akko cried.

Darius snapped his wand towards the ceiling and brought the broom to a screeching halt, pulling it almost vertical and planting his boots against it. Akko dangled from his waist, wailing and windmilling her legs, then accepted her fate and dropped to the stone tiles. THUD.

"Oof! You okay, Akko?" Darius called.

"Ugh, yeah, I…" Akko started, then gasped.

The blob of darkness had settled on the floor in a black flower, swaying and quivering as if from a soft breeze. There was a slender, half-formed figure crouched at its center, doubled over and despondent, but its glowing eyes were merry when they rose to meet Akko's. "Shouldn't you be a better rider, O Ser Knight?" Sucy asked with a chuckle.

"Shouldn't you… have… skin?" Akko replied, then blinked a few times. "Wait, sorry, is that—? What am I looking at? Sucy, are you okay?"

Darius landed alongside Akko and helped her up, but his eyes were fixed on Sucy. "Sucy… shit…"

"Did you see any bone? How embarrassing." Sucy stood and the shadow retracted to a narrow ring at her feet, rising about her like flames. She looked more or less like herself again, though etched out in harsh chiaroscuro, with only her eyes showing any color. "Don't worry; this stuff is protecting me. I was just up getting cooked alive in the lab."

"Wh-what did Croix do to you?" Akko asked.

"She figured out how to zap my shade away, and the Stone got me." Sucy glanced back up towards the lab. "She's quick. Don't underestimate her when you get up there."

"If it's like what's going on with Barbara," Darius said. "Conz might be able to help."

"I'll ask her. Oh, and I have something for you." Sucy produced the Shiny Rod and lobbed it underhand towards Akko, who squawked and flailed in shock before effortlessly snatching it from the air. "Don't know if you want to run that away from her, or go up and smack her with it, but it's up to you."

Akko stared at the Rod apprehensively.

"Hey, didn't we have something for Sucy?" Darius prodded.

"What? Oh, right." Akko shook herself off and unclipped the case from her belt. "For you, if you have to fight any magitronics in here."

"Sure," Sucy accepted the case with both hands. "I doubt I'll have to, though. Have you seen what that tutor of yours is doing to the place?" Without waiting for an answer, she fell backwards through the floor and pulled her shade after her.

"Y'know, that just looks natural, coming from her," Darius said, mounting up and holding out a hand for Akko to join him. "Let's get going."

"I wish I could fly on my own," Akko sighed, accepting his hand. "Then I could run this out and you could keep going in."

"You wouldn't want to fly away from Lotte, though."

"I wouldn't, no." Akko dropped the Rod through her belt. "It just feels dumb to be taking the Rod right back up to Croix, is all."

"What are we, if not dumb?" Darius asked philosophically. "Anyway, I'm thinking I might stab her after all."

The diversion team's delve was almost as easy. Hannah flew low at a running pace and Diana held on behind her, wielding the magitronic revolver with unerring speed and skill. Each attacking pixel was speared by a green beam, silent but for the soft ping of the gun's hammer falling on its crystal firing pin. Hannah had little to say, following Diana's murmured directions as they wound deeper and deeper into the labyrinth, and away from Akko's team.

"Is the other you some kind of war mach… um, warrior?" Hannah finally asked. "No offense, but I just can't picture Diana Prime gunslinging like this."

"Diana Prime would prefer to use a spell of her own," Diana agreed. "But Diana Bar has no inclination or instinct for violence whatsoever. From her perspective, the witch is a wild and fearsome creature. One of me is providing aggression, the other, precision."

"Maybe you should keep the gun," Hannah suggested. "I have my wand, and you… uh, can you even use yours? I haven't seen you do any magic."

"Good point; I will hold on to this until you need it. Thank you." Diana took aim and fired two more shots. "Does it make you uneasy? Constanze designed it based on your interview with Wangari."

"I've got some family members across the pond who are way too into guns," Hannah said. "Hannah Prime does, I mean. And the other me was… uh… I was on my way to get my gun back, but I don't want it anymore."

"I see."

Hannah snickered. "No, you don't."

"No, but I imagined that you wouldn't want to talk about it." Diana's voice wavered slightly. "At least not with me. Turn right ahead."

"You're really upset, aren't you?" Hannah asked.

"A bit. I'm trying not to trouble you with it, at least until all this is resolved. After all, your anger is completely justified."

Hannah slewed the broom sideways to drift through the turn, but instead of continuing down the new heading, she kept them skidding in a circle to come to a stop. "Diana…" she said, then just let out a long, low groan as they descended and lightly touched down. "Get off."

Diana did. Her expression was dispassionate, but the set of her shoulders suggested that she was bracing herself.

"It's a big mistake to try and have a serious conversation when we're both like this," Hannah said. "But I need you to understand something. And… it is just such a pain to figure out how to say it, when it's half of me thinking one thing, and the other half… argh!"

Diana glanced back the way they'd come. "Do we need to be stopped in order to…?"

"Shut up and let me get this out." Hannah twitched in surprise at herself, then barreled ahead. "Listen: all this time I've been reacting to something Me Bar's Diana did to me, not you. Got it? I've been angry with her. The accident with the ritual sucked, but we're witch students. We're supposed to get up to risky forbidden rituals. You don't get to take all the blame for that!"

"But—"

"You don't. Do you have any idea how condescending that is? Acting like we're your lackeys you dragged out in the middle of the night, instead of friends who chose to help you? Like you're somehow responsible for me and Barbara?"

"Just after the ritual, Barbara said something similar," Diana said. "Perhaps I should have taken it to heart then."

"Yeah, maybe. You'd just turned into a cyborg, though; you were probably a little distracted." Hannah looked away. "Also, I don't think this'll come up, but don't make any more comments about someone shooting you. It's something Me Bar was thinking about, with her Diana, and I don't want to even – I don't want that in my head."

Diana's eyes widened fractionally. "What did she do to you?"

Hannah almost answered but realized it would be too easy to draw a line from a dead Barbara to a ghost Barbara. "It's not relevant to you and me, so never mind it."

"As you wish," Diana said reluctantly.

"So, I'm stuck. I'm really frustrated with you, and I don't know how much of it is the other Diana, and how much of it is stuff Me Prime's been repressing, and what all the three of us will have to talk about when we're ourselves again. But we… we'll have to change things, right?"

Diana nodded slowly. "I do… have some things to rethink, and some apologies to make, but it would be empty to do so before we're certain of what exactly I'm apologizing for. I must warn you that the human Diana will be just as bewildered when we have that conversation, so I hope that you'll be patient with me."

"Bewildered, huh?" Hannah's expression softened. "I never asked how you were handling all this. I'll bet it's been tough."

"It's gone surprisingly well, all told." Diana smiled hesitantly, but let it drop as a shadow fell over her senses. "In the interests of not being condescending, Constanze shared some concerning information with me earlier – ah, but it will have to wait. Look to your left."

A few dozen meters behind them, a swarm of pixels filled the corridor wall-to-wall. A group had gathered into a tight formation at the center, forming a larger cube that throbbed like an angular heart. It drifted to a halt as they watched.

"What the hell is that?" Hannah gasped. "Why isn't it attacking?"

"Yes, Constanze, I had the same thought," Diana said, then turned to Hannah. "We misconstrued the defense system's actions. It wasn't reacting to me as a magitronic being; it's likely identified Diana Cavendish, the so-called Pride of Luna Nova, as a threat. It's been trying to herd us away from the lab – and the others – all this time."

"And she probably wants Akko up there," Hannah suggested. "Since she's messing with the Claiomh Solais. She'd want a look at the wielder, right?"

"That hadn't occurred to me, but it seems likely. Should we tell them to retreat?"

"Would they listen?"

"Hm. Clearly not." Diana crossed her arms. "Nor would I, in their position."

Hannah nodded sharply and faced the wall of pixels. "So let's get there ourselves, and do whatever it is Croix is afraid of us doing!"

"If she's worried about my magic, that may not…" Diana cut herself off. "Yes. You're right. If we're not aiding our allies by being here, then we should get to their side. But how?"

"Stand back and cover your eyes," Hannah commanded, then stepped forward and cast a lightning bolt into the center of the mass. The CRACK was deafening in the enclosed hall and its flash painted every surface stark white. Half of the pixels were vaporized on the spot, and the rest blew away from the impact and clattered to the tiles, inert. Hannah turned back with a smile. "How was that?"

Diana was staring at her with an odd, tense expression.

"Is something wrong?" Hannah asked, stepping closer.

Diana jumped back. Her lips formed 'stay away!', but all that emerged was a soft buzz. She raised her hands to cover her mouth, then held them out in dismay when she saw that they were trembling in a jerky, uncanny way. She tried to talk again and doubled over, clutching her middle.

"What are you—oh no, you're part robot! You have metal in you!" Hannah cried. "I just filled you with lightning, didn't I? Wh-what do I do now?"

A stanbot's voice blared from her wand. "CONJURE SOMETHING CONDUCTIVE." She reflexively raised her wand, but her incantation became a growl when the stanbot added, "AWAY FROM YOURSELF, IDIOT."

An umbrella popped into being behind Diana and she reached for it. SNAP. A heap of molten metal and burning fabric hit the ground. Diana dropped to one knee and coughed, smoke curling from her mouth. "That's… that's better," she croaked.

"I'm – I'm so sorry!" Hannah rushed to her side. "Are you okay? Do you need to go to the nurse's offi – I, I mean, to Constanze?"

"I should be fine," Diana said. The smoke tapered off as they rose together. "Power surges are a known hazard aboard spaceships, so I'm designed to… er, Constanze? Can you confirm?" She listened for a moment. "Thank you. Yes, I seem to be unharmed. Of course, I'll ask you to be more careful in the future, Hannah."

"Yes, of course! I really am sorry!"

"Also, I'm at full power again," Diana commented, losing her focus. "This body is so strange…"

Hannah rested her forehead against Diana's shoulder for a moment, then straightened. "Alright. Okay. Um, if you're okay, should we go?"

"Er, yes. Of course. And quickly – I can sense more such formations closing in." As they took off, Diana continued, "I didn't know you had such a talent for destruction, Hannah. It's not the kind of skill Luna Nova cultivates."

"Do I? It just feels good to throw lightning."

Diana shifted to ride sidesaddle and turned back to take aim at a new wave of pixels gathering in their wake, keeping an arm hooked around Hannah. "I believe you do. I wouldn't have been able to cast a bolt half so fierce. When we get to her stronghold, it may turn out that you were the one Croix should have feared!"

Hannah blushed furiously and held up her wand. "Y-you aren't listening in, are you Conz?"

"NOT INTENTIONALLY."

"Damn it! Barb had better change her password after all this!"

At the leading edge of the invasion, Chariot was wading through yet another wave of defenders. Gargoyles pounced and stone soldiers formed phalanxes before her. Volleys of stone arrows riddled the walls and boulders arced ponderously through the sterile air.

As the statues fell, the pixels possessing them flew free and gathered in clouds beyond her reach. She'd have swept them away if the statues had let up for even a moment, but more and more were piling in and all but jumping onto her sword. She darted and leapt her way down the corridor, crimson hair flying, sword lashing in great emerald arcs, multi-ton figures flying from punishing kicks.

One of the last statues caught her ankle, then another vaulted past to grab her in a bear hug. The free pixels converged behind her and combined into the form of a scorpion, drawing its wicked tail back to strike. "Kastabort!" Chariot roared, and a wave of force knocked the statues tumbling. She whirled to parry, but the stinger was already flashing in—

—and then a purple bird fluttering above the scorpion transformed into an elephant and flattened it, knocking Chariot sprawling. The remaining pixels swirled up and reformed into a spider, but the elephant's trunk snagged it and dashed it into the wall. Instead of making another monster, the pixels streaked down in a volley and the elephant shrank into a mouse to dodge them. The pixels merged into one last form, a gorilla – then the mouse became a girl and decapitated it with a crackling purple swipe of her sword. Its body went dark and crumbled at her feet as she turned her attention to Chariot.

For a few seconds, they just stood there, taking each other in. Darius coasted up on the scene but sensed the tension and kept his distance.

"Professor… Ursula…?" Akko finally asked, slowly lowering the blade to her side.

"A-Akko?" Chariot replied, barely recognizing her.

"It's true. It really is you. Sh-Shiny Chariot." Akko said in an off-kilter voice. "I think I always knew, but… but how? How did I know? It doesn't make any sense. Why would you…?" She unslung the Shiny Rod and held it out. "Anyway, here."

Chariot held her hands out. "I don't think I…"

"Here!" Akko snapped, thrusting it forward. "Wasn't this always the plan? Isn't this what I always said I'd do? If there's something else I should be doing with this thing, like breaking a grand triskel-whatever and saving magic, you should have told me."

"Akko, I can explain…"

"No. No! How can you explain this? How could you possibly make it make sense?" Akko yelled. "You were dangling meeting yourself over my head! You made a fool of me! Why? Should I care why? I don't know! Take the goddamn Rod, Chariot!"

"Yeah, you tell her!" Darius cheered. He obviously had no clue of what was going on.

Chariot spared him an annoyed glance and reached out for the Shiny Rod. As her hand drew near, a green bolt leapt from it and stung her. She gritted her teeth and pressed on, but a crackling storm grew between them and drove her back.

Akko's fury collapsed into ashes as the Rod fell to her side. "Really?"

"I'm sorry."

"I'll bet," Akko said dully. All the color had drained from her. "I trusted you. And just now I came to you, wanting you to be my Ursula, to hold me steady – and there's two of you, too. I don't… I can't. I can't think about this now. We have a job to do."

"Your friend," Chariot agreed. "I'm here to help her."

Akko nodded listlessly. "Okay." Chariot took half a step towards her, raising a hand, but she jolted back. "Don't touch me."

Chariot retreated. "Alright. I'll range ahead and clear the way for you. We should be to the lab in no time."

"I'd like to see you keep ahead of me without a…" Darius started, then his jaw dropped as Chariot became a navy blur in the distance. "…broom? Holy shit."

Akko clambered up behind him and slumped against his back.

"You wanna talk about it?" he asked.

"I wanna find something to hit with my sword," Akko grumbled into his shoulders.

"Heh." Darius kicked off. "You got it."

Constanze had invited Wangari into her workshop, but still almost screamed when her guest hit the bottom of the chute in an ungainly tangle of limbs and a blizzard of papers. She'd made it months with no intruders, but how many did this make just today? (Three! Madness!)

"Sorry, sorry," Wangari half-whispered, scrambling to her feet and gathering up her papers. "Is this your place? Wow! Amanda really undersold it!"

Constanze looked at her with growing dread.

"Don't worry," Wangari said. "I can be quiet! It feels like a church in here. Anyway, I think I have a ritual we can use. Goes up to 12, just in case. Also, I brought my broom!"

Constanze held up a hand and passed the other over her eyes. Hold on a moment! She pointed to Wangari's broom and spread her hand in a question.

"We all have to be together to do the ritual. I figured we'd go wherever we're doing it right after we get Lotte."

Constanze wasn't thrilled with the idea, but nodded reluctantly. Next, she pointed to Wangari's papers and slapped an open palm on a clear plastic pane alongside one of her computers.

"Is that a scanner? Keen!" Wangari crossed and gingerly laid her magic circle diagram across it. "How'd you get it to work here? Never mind, I'll bug you about it later."

Finally, Constanze pointed to the bank of monitors showing the New Moon Tower's security system and shooed her towards them.

"Hello, Witch Brigade," Wangari said into her wand, setting Barbara's crystal ball on the desk beneath the monitors. "I'm coming to you live from Constanze's workshop… uh, very quietly. First update: Diana and Hannah are coming up behind you, Amanda. If you wait… four minutes, looks like, you can all hit the lab together."

"Nope," Darius said.

"Nope?"

"No time to wait! Gonna stab Croix!"

"Don't be terrible, Darius!" Akko snapped in the background.

"Well, I'm at least throwing some punches!"

Wangari and Constanze shared a look and the engineer shrugged. "Anyway, you'll be two minutes from the lab… now," Wangari reported. "Professor Callistis is standing inside the door – she'll be there right when you turn the corner, so be sure not to hit her."

"Considering that, too, but thanks."

"Wait, what do we have against Cal—?"

Constanze abruptly turned on her heel and racked a shotgun. Wangari stumbled back, clutching her chest, but it was just Sucy appearing out of thin air behind them. Constanze looked between them, then down at her gun. After a moment's consideration, she trotted over, unloaded the gun, and locked it in a display case.

"Is this a bad time?" Sucy asked.

Conz nodded angrily, but then beckoned Sucy deeper into her workshop. Before they stepped through the first sealed door, she waved at Wangari and pointed at the screen.

"Sure, got it," Wangari said. "Hannah? Hey. Amanda's not waiting for you, so I'll keep you posted on whatever mess you'll be wading into."

"Ugh. Thanks for trying. Hold on, Diana!"

The lab was dim and quiet, lit only by the forcefield gleaming in through every window and the red-gold helix of magic streaming into the Noir Rod. Croix stood silhouetted against its shadowy bulk atop a large sorcery unit, eyes hidden by her goggles, arms crossed, pulsing red, then gold, then red under the stream's light. Below her, Chariot stood in the ruins of another useless security door, looking up with stony eyes.

"Well?" Croix asked. "Don't you have anything to say?"

"No," Chariot said. "Except this: turn your security off and let our student go, right now, and they might shorten your sentence."

Croix scoffed. "You're coming on awfully strong. Is it so hard to believe that Lotte's helping me willingly?"

"I can believe you convinced her. You're good at that."

"Picked it up from Woodward," Croix said with a shrug. "I saw your little encounter with Akko, by the way. You seriously didn't tell her what the Words of Arcturus were for? No wonder you're in such a sour mood. I thought I'd have to at least try to drive a wedge between you, but you took care of that yourself!"

Chariot didn't reply.

"And now you're wondering how different what you're doing is from this, aren't…?"

"I'm not here to play games, Croix. Let Lotte go. If you say even one more word before she's down here with me, safe and sound, I'm going to…"

"COWABUNGA!" Darius roared, passing two centimeters over Chariot's head, turning 90 degrees straight up, and leaping from his broom in midflight with a fist cocked back. Akko screamed all through the broom's ballistic arc, which ended in a crash somewhere on the sixth-floor balcony. Croix could only stare in shock before a right hook knocked her spinning.

Darius landed on the sorcery unit with her and kept swinging. Croix tried to fight back, but the young witch zipped all around her, flashing between huge, sweeping blows and holding dynamic poses while she reeled back dramatically. It was as though there were a high-speed photographer standing by to capture each hit, though Croix probably wasn't cooperating on purpose.

Chariot raised her wand to intervene, but the sorcery unit was careening all over the room and Darius was coming at Croix from every direction at once. She couldn't even cast a wall between them unless—

"Maximum lockdown engaged," a calm computer voice announced.

"Wha—?" Darius paused in mid-rampage, noting the ominous red lights flaring to life all around, and Chariot cast a green bubble around him an instant before the air filled with crisscrossing beams.

Croix retreated further up into the lab, stopping level with the Noir Rod, and pointed. "Capture them!" she snarled, spitting flecks of blood around a hand clutched to her face. "Route all auxiliary power to security and take them down!"

Darius hopped free of the bubble as it drifted down to Chariot's side. "Sorry?" he tried, giving her a nervous smile as the lab above them turned into a boiling cloud of pixels and the sinister glaring eyes of sorcery units cut down.

Chariot sighed. It'd been a bad move tactically, but how could she blame anyone for punching Croix in the face?

Akko quickly zeroed in on Lotte's prison and kicked the door in, but then froze, taking in a dark room full of incomprehensible consoles and blinking lights. Waves of frustration and excitement washed through her and subsided in time with the helix turning just a few centimeters above her head. That's probably bad for me, she realized, but the constant heart-scrambling was making it hard to form an opinion. Thankfully, the effect cleared as she moved deeper into the room and got past the bed.

Lotte lay half-curled, side rising and falling with deep, steady breaths. Red and gold light rose from her chest like incense smoke and gathered in the ring overhead, where it was processed into the motes racing out to the Rod. Reflexively, Akko checked the wound from Sucy's teeth. It was still there, but was healing much faster than Dame Kagari knew to expect. Was that a vampire thing, or because Lotte was a witch?

"Let's get you out of there," Akko said, clapping her hands, then started hunting around the consoles. Unfortunately, the few buttons that were even marked had incomprehensible labels. Apart from the security console Sucy had mostly smashed, none of the monitors were displaying anything she could understand either – just wobbling graphs and cryptic bars rising and falling. A bar along the bottom of the biggest monitor was about ¾ full and creeping steadily upward, which she could guess was bad news.

Then Akko's eyes fell on a big red button stamped with an "on" symbol. "Aha! Of course!" she cried, thrusting a finger towards it.

"Stop," an eerie robed figure said from the doorway. "Don't be reckless."

"S-Sucy?" Akko asked. "Is that you? Why do you look like a shinigami?"

"She's not here," Sucy said, sweeping into the room and throwing her hood back. Even in the dim light, shadow rippled around her head like a black halo. "That's just a body."

Akko turned sheet white. "She's… she's dead?"

"No, stupid! She's just somewhere else." Sucy blinked. "Oh, right, I wasn't answering your question. Conz made this robe to protect me from… ugh, stop crying! We can still help her!"

Akko snapped out of it instantly. "We can!? What do we do?"

"I can see your heart," Sucy explained, pressing a cool hand into the center of Akko's chest. She turned slowly, drawing her finger along an invisible line. "It still points the way to Lotte, wherever she is. I think I can follow it, as long as you stay still at this end. Keep anyone from messing with her body and make sure this thing keeps her alive, and don't move away from this spot for anything. I'll try and bring her back."

"O-okay," Akko said, swiping at her cheeks. "But hurry!"

Sucy started to turn away, but then hesitated with an uncomfortable look on her face and patted Akko's head. "With everything else the three of us have gone through, this'd be a stupid way to lose her." With that, she strode off through the wall, spreading her fins to race off into the darkness beyond.

Akko summoned a sword and shield and waited, listening to the battle outside. Over the next few seconds, she lowered the weapons to her sides and cast her head back. "Why do I have to do the boring part?" she whined. Not that brawling with robo-monsters was fun, but the tension of being unable to help or even see her friends was unbearable.

"Auxiliary power redirected," a computer voice intoned, and the room's security camera snapped towards her. The room was sliced apart by zigzagging forcefields and a cloud of pixels descended with an angry drone.

"Aaagh sorry I take it back AAAAAH!"

"Honestly, I'd just tell you not to go in," Wangari advised. "It's chaos in there."

"Not helpful," Hannah snapped, pouring on speed. "Where is everyone?"

"Amanda and Chariot are fighting at the entrance, Akko's up in the room with Lotte, uh, talking to thin air? Must be Sucy. And Croix's in the middle of the lab, about ten meters up, in some kind of shield bubble."

"What are you going to—?" Diana started, but they'd already plunged into the battlefield.

Darius and Chariot fought back to back in a ring of grotesque pixel-monsters with a mix of orangutan and grasshopper features. Darius was keeping them both supplied with crystal-treated swords; instead of just chopping the pixel creatures apart to reform, Constanze's blades struck them down. The witches were already ankle-deep in crumbled plastic that crunched underfoot like snow and discarded blades.

"Break!" Hannah barked, and she and Diana leapt free of the broom in opposite directions, leaving it to be shredded in the pixel storm overhead. Guessing what her friend would do, Diana scrambled to the wall and gripped its metal fittings. Hannah rolled to her feet and took a firing stance with her wand. "Fulgerbici!"

Lightning crackled up along one side of the lab, killing dozens of pixels and driving the monsters back. Even Croix evaded as her personal shield faltered and blinked out. Hannah tried to sweep her spell across the lab, but when the main bolt hit the Noir Rod, it held fast and started greedily sucking its energy away.

Hannah fell to one knee as her spell faded, and quiet fell. The remaining monsters stayed back, and the pixels had formed a silent checkerboard in the air.

"Shit, remind me never to piss her off," Darius said.

"You're talking," Hannah replied. "So too late."

"Ha!"

Diana rushed to Hannah's side, but still had the presence of mind to turn on her heel and snap off a shot with her revolver, neatly frying the tablet out of Croix's hand. She was reduced to making her sorcery unit descend towards them with a stomp.

"There," Chariot said. "Without your minions, how can you—?"

Croix drew a wand – an unadorned, plain Jane, perfectly traditional Luna Nova wand – and cast one spell. The floor melted into a forest of grasping hands beneath the witches and grabbed their arms and legs, striking wands and weapons from their hands with painful slaps. Diana managed to keep one arm free by folding it against her chest, but otherwise, they were caught fast.

"What—when did you learn that spell?" Chariot gasped.

"Imagine that! A witch! Using magic! I swear, Chariot, you are every bit as arrogant and stupid as you think I am!" Croix held up a hand to accept a new tablet but kept her wand trained on them. "I'm going to prepare some secure rooms for you while I save magic. You can all thank me when you get out."

Chariot just stared murder at her.

"Your ritual will surely fail," Diana said confidently.

"Oh? And why's that?" Croix crossed to her, idly twirling her wand through her fingers. "I must say, I was disappointed in your performance. Doesn't your family have any secret Cavendish spells for occasions like this? I expected at least a spirited murowa or two from you."

"I suppose you don't know how cruel those words are, just now," Diana said. In her free hand, she held up the purple crystal Jasminka had given her. "At any rate, as long as this disruption crystal remains intact, no magical ritual within 500 meters can…"

Croix lightly tapped it with her wand, and a hundred jagged fragments pattered to their feet. "Thank you for pointing out the problem. Very polite of you."

"The pleasure was all mine," Diana replied. "I wasn't strong enough to break it on my own."

CRUMP. The tower shook and darkness fell as the forcefield flickered out. The helix kept turning overhead but wasn't enough to light the cavernous space.

Croix summoned a pale white light from her wand and looked up in dread. "What did you do?"

CRUMP.

"We can only wait and see," Diana said. "I'm sorry."

CRASH! A great wedge of purple crystal slammed through the south wall like the prow of an icebreaker and then burst apart into brutish figures. They fell among the pixel monsters and laid about with screaming sawblades and bellows of, "DESTROY! DESTROY!" In seconds, her army had been routed.

When the invaders had cleared a circle, they turned inward and bowed. Jasminka hovered slowly down from and landed in the center, magnificent in the icy starlight. She bade her minions rise and freed the witches with a lazy swing of her wand.

Croix had retreated into the air, but once she had a proper view of the carnage, she could only stand there with her arms at her sides, silently mouthing, What the fuck?

"Croix Meridies!" Jasminka called, pointing imperiously. "You've had your fun, but this ends now. I'm feeling magnanimous, so I'm going to give you this one chance to release my friends…" Her pointing finger became a fist. "…and kneel before me!"