Old Friends, New Names, Part 1
Another tour.
It had been a few months since Homulilly and Gretchen had first arrived at, what was for all intents and purposes, their afterlife. It had been a few months since they had been picked up at Doomsday Clock and taken to the seaside town of Freehaven, populated by the spirits of dead girls who had decided to carve out some semblance of a normal life in a place that was decidedly abnormal. It had been a few months since they had joined a small group of other girls, all who had, at one point or another, made a contract with an extraterrestrial being known as an "Incubator," gaining power and responsibilities in return for the granting of a single wish. It had been a few months since they had all learned that the whole thing was one big con, that the Incubators were feeding on them through the contracts that they made, and that they were doomed to either die in battle or one day become the very monsters that they were fighting, and that some of them already had, only regaining their humanity, but not their memories, through death.
It had been a few months since all of that, a few months spent at the Freehaven Integration Bureau, an organization geared toward helping the newly dead come to terms with their own deaths and hopefully build a new life for themselves.
And Homulilly still didn't know how she felt about the place.
Every morning she and Gretchen would wake up in the small apartment that they shared. That part she liked. Their apartment may not be large, but it was theirs, their own little sanctuary, isolated from the weirdness of the rest of the world, with just her and Gretchen.
But after that would come breakfast, which was taken with the rest of the girls. That had been rough enough when it had just been the witches, but now the magical girls were with them as well. True, there weren't many of them, but it was still more people being constantly around.
Still, she had endured, she had stayed quiet, she had tolerated. And in time, she was coming to get used to them as well. So long as they stayed away from her, she could put up with them.
But there was always something looming in the background, a dark cloud on the horizon, a day in which her world would again grow larger against her will, a day when she would have to step outside where she felt safe into something bigger and scarier.
The day in which the girls would be shown around the town.
Of course everyone else had been looking forward to it. Of course the closer the day got, the more everyone was talking about it. Freehaven looked so beautiful, so cool, so wonderful! Oh, I can't wait to actually be in that beautiful city, to meet the other magical girls and witches, to get a taste of my new home!
Homulilly, however, could do without any of that. She was sure that Freehaven was a nice place, but all she needed was her small apartment with her best friend. She didn't care about going anywhere else.
Alas, she had no choice. The trip was mandatory, the day unavoidable.
And now that day had come.
Now it was time to be shown the city that house their new home. It was time to see Freehaven.
"Oh, can't wait, can't wait," Gretchen sang to herself as she fussed around in the bathroom. She was already dressed, but she was double and triple checking her appearance in the mirror, making sure her hair was perfect while applying some blush to her cheeks. Earlier that week Gretchen had suddenly felt that if they were to be shown the city, then she ought to have some kind of makeup, because it was their first time going out in public and she wanted to look her best. She had started asking around, wondering if any of the other girls knew how to get some, expecting there to be some kind of black-market for such goods, but to her surprise the FIB had caught wind of her requests and just gave her some.
"Well, yeah," had been the caretaker's bemused response. "So long as you're neat, why couldn't you?"
Personally, Homulilly felt that Gretchen looked just fine without it, but if it made her happy, then she wasn't going to object. She finished straightening her uniform, made sure that her gloves were in place, and waited for Gretchen to finish up.
"All done!" Gretchen whirled around and spread her arms. "Tah-dah! What do you think?"
Homulilly blinked.
And then she giggled.
"Huh?" Gretchen said.
Homulilly quickly composed herself. "Um, you might have gone a little overboard with the eyeliner there."
"I did?" Gretchen turned back to the mirror. "Oh no, you're right, I did! But I thought I had followed the instructions perfectly! Uh, er, um…"
"All right, calm down." Homulilly walked over to her and picked up the washcloth. "It should be easy to fix."
She helped Gretchen wipe away the excess makeup and, studying the directions that had come with the kit, reapply where it was needed. "See? There you go! Sometimes less is more."
Gretchen beamed at her reflection. "You're right. Thank you so much!"
Smiling, Homulilly nodded and walked from the bathroom. Then she closed her eyes and breathed in deep.
I can do this, she said. I won't have to actually do anything or talk to anyone. It's just a tour. I just have to follow the rest of the group, and then we can go home.
"Um, Lily-chan?"
Homulilly breathed out and turned back to her best (and honestly, only) friend. "Hmmm?"
Gretchen was fidgeting, the tips of her legs curling up, a sure sign that she had an uncomfortable question but wasn't sure how to ask it. "H-How come you, uh…"
Homulilly sighed. "It's okay. You can ask it. I won't be offended."
"O-Okay. Um, how come you're so cool and confident when doing things in here, but you get so, you know…"
"Shy?"
Gretchen nodded. "Everyone we've met is so nice! And I know lots that would love to be your friend! You know, like Lindy-chan, Zhao-chan…"
Homulilly sighed. "Because…I don't want to be friends with them! They're fine, I don't hate them or anything, but we all wouldn't even be together if the FIB didn't make us! It was pure chance! Besides, you're the only friend I need."
Gretchen fell into a thoughtful silence for a bit. Then she said, "Well, I think you should at least try. It could be good for you!"
Right. Good for her. Sighing again, Homulilly just turned toward the door. The day was going to be stressful enough without starting it off with an argument.
…
"All right, everyone here?"
The class was gathered in the plaza in front of the FIB's central building. At the head of the group were three caretakers. First was Dr. Cynthia, of course. There was also a tall Arab girl with bright orange eyes who wore a spotless orange burqa in addition to her caretaker uniform. Her name was Dr. Rizwana, and she had been to the Puella Magi what Dr. Cynthia had been to the witches, the one mainly in charge of getting them used to their new lives before they were introduced to the rest of the class.
And then there was the one with the short, curly, dark hair, whom Homulilly had since learned was named Dr. Alice. Now that the two groups had been merged, she now seemed to be the one in charge of the class as a whole.
Dr. Alice looked around the group and smiled. "Okay girls!" she said, clasping her hands. "Who's ready to have her world grow a whole lot bigger?"
A smattering of clapping and a few whoops went up in response, including Gretchen, and not including Homulilly.
"Then follow me." Dr. Alice turned and walked to the front gate, and everyone followed.
Everyone crossed over the threshold that led to the streets without hesitation, but Homulilly held back a bit. She looked down at the ground, where the concrete of the FIB courtyard met the differently colored tiles of the streets of Freehaven. Until now, the FIB had been the only world she had ever really known. And just when it had started to feel safe and familiar, she had to leave, and even though it was only for a little bit, she still didn't care to.
Gretchen, who had been holding onto her hand, noticed the pause. "Homulilly-chan?" she said, tilting her head. "What's wrong?"
Do it for her. Forcing what she hoped was a disarming smile, Homulilly said, "Nothing!" and hurried to catch up.
Though she had never set foot into the city at large until now, Homulilly had still seen enough from windows, pictures, and descriptions to know what it was like. Built upon the slope of a tall hill that extended down to the sea, Freehaven was a town of tall buildings with white walls, arching windows and doorway, and flat roofs made from dark red tiles. Tiered towers with curving corners rose up here and there, and from what she could tell, all the roads were really, really narrow, sandwiched between the buildings like an endless network of alleyways.
Fortunately, the road they were on was wide enough, and the buildings small with more space between them. At least Homulilly didn't have to feel crowded in as well as too exposed.
Their path took them down into what looked like a public park, albeit a small one. It was a perfect square, with walkways between grassy knolls and shady trees. In the center was a great marble found surrounded by benches, and surrounding the park itself were several small businesses. Homulilly glanced around and saw a shoe store, an ice cream parlor, and a bakery.
Dr. Alice led the class into the park, stopping only when she reached the fountain.
"Okay, girls," she said, turning toward the group. "Welcome to Freehaven. Now, we at the FIB understand what a scary, tumultuous, and traumatic your first few weeks are, and your safety and mental well-being are among our tops priorities. However, we also do not believe that being forcibly isolated from the world at large is healthy. So in three months time, you will all gain access to what is referred to as the 'protected zone,' a part of Freehaven that is jointly controlled by the FIB and is freely available to everyone."
A round of murmurs went up in response to this. "So, we can go out by ourselves?" asked Brittney.
"So long as you stay within the protected zone, which consists of everything you see in this square, as well as several other points, which will be detailed to you in time. Anyone wishing to explore the greater city at large needs a caretaker along as a chaperone, or two pre-approved Freehaven residents. But as time passes you'll gain more freedom to go where you please."
"Why here though?" Shiloh asked. "Are there like cameras watching this place?"
"There are," Dr. Alice said calmly. "Among other things."
Shiloh frowned. "That sounds…kind of Big Brother."
"Big Sister, actually. And I understand that being under surveillance might rankle, but understand that it is for a reason. There is a delicate balance between to much protection and too little, and we dance on that knife's edge every day." Her face turned sad for a moment. "Trust me, we've had plenty of times to make mistakes."
Homulilly wondered what she was implying by that, and if she really wanted to know the answer.
Vendel then raised her hand. "Okay, but, like, what good do all these stores do us?" she said. "It's not like any of us have any money."
"Yet," Dr. Alice told her. "Once you're given access to the outside, you will also be provided with a weekly allowance of seventy-five talents each."
Talents were, as far as Homulilly was able to gauge, the local currency, though she still didn't know what the exchange rate was compared to what they had back in the world of the living.
"Money?" Lucy said, perking up. "And we can spend it on whatever we like?"
"Within reason. I'd ask that you refrain from participating in the drug trade or the trafficking of exotic animals. We have enough headaches to deal with as it is without you all getting blasted on dream drops or letting valks run about the place."
That got a few giggles, but also a few blank stared.
"What are dream drops?" Claudia said.
"What are valks?" added Heather.
"A type of drug and a type of exotic animal, neither of which we want in our buildings," Dr. Alice said primly. "And now, I think we'd better visit our first stop of the day. The public library."
…
"Holy moly!" Iris blurted out as Dr. Alice led the group in through the front doors of the Freehaven Public Library. Several murmured agreements rose up. Homulilly just bleakly looked up in dismay. Once again, it was too big.
She had thought that the FIB library was huge, but of course this one had to be bigger. A four-story building, it shunned the traditional white walls and flat red roof of its neighbors and instead was designed more in line with classic Roman architecture, complete with rising columns and marble statues.
Inside though, it seemed that the aesthetic they were going for was the sunken city of Atlantis. It preserved the Romanian look, but now it had been deliberately designed to appear as if it were being consumed by coral, with painted representations of sealife along the marble columns, book shelves, and walls.
Dr. Alice led the group down the waxed center walkway of black stone to the central rotunda, which got another chorus of oohs and ahs from the group. The interior of the central dome was of blue glass, and refracted light in such a way that gave it a hazy, underwater quality. The shapes of fish, turtles, and even a whale slowly swam just outside the dome, probably a magical effect of some kind.
"Now, the library is one of the oldest buildings in Freehaven," Dr. Alice told them. She took them to a glassed-in display, in which was what looked like a section of wall made from cracked grey clay and reed. "When it was first constructed, it was a simple mud hut used to keep clay tablets and early papyrus scrolls out of the heat. It now towers at a full four stories high and two stories down and takes up an entire city block. Perhaps not large when compared to modern skyscrapers, especially not when you have structures like Steel City to account for, but the wealth of accumulated knowledge is second to none."
"Steel City?" Jordan asked.
"Oh, I know this one!" Brittney cut in. "That's that one city that's just one really, really tall skyscraper, right?"
"Exactly!" Dr. Cynthia said. "Two-thousand, six-hundred and seventy-four stories tall. However, Steel City is a one-of-a-kind outlier that is really unfair to be compared to."
Homulilly felt her insides squirm. There was a building that was over two-thousand stories tall? Why was everything so big?
Then Gretchen nudged Homulilly with her elbow. "Homulilly," she whispered. "Look."
Though she dreaded seeing another weird and uncomfortable thing, Homulilly looked.
Gretchen was pointing to a pair of girls that were standing together in the stacks, talking to one another, both of them witches. The taller of the two, who was wearing a white-and-pink striped shirt and a tight pair of brown capri pants, had short pink hair and baby-blue eyes. Her skin was bone-white, and she had a small, slender black tail with pink polka-dots sticking out of the back of her pants, and seemed to be one of the librarians, as she had a name tag and was shelving books from a cart. The shorter was a blonde girl wearing stonewashed jeans and a white blouse, who had a pair of golden ribbons instead of arms coming out of her sleeves.
Homulilly stared blankly at them. To her, it was just another pair of witches. They had seen others like them every day. "What about them?" she said.
"The blonde girl, with the ribbons! Doesn't she look kind of familiar?"
Homulilly looked again. Now that Gretchen had mentioned it, there was something weirdly familiar about her. Though Homulilly was fairly certain that she had never seen her in her admittedly short life, she was getting the weirdest sense of déjà vu from her.
"You know, she kind of does," Homulilly said, frowning. "But where though?"
"Maybe we've seen her at the FIB and just never really noticed her?"
"No, I don't think so. It's…It's like I've met her in a dream or something."
Right about then, almost as if she had sensed that she was being watched, the blonde suddenly turned her head to look straight at them. She blinked, and tilted her head in bemusement.
Homulilly and Gretchen hastily looked away.
"Oops," Gretchen muttered. "I hope she doesn't think that we're weird."
Homullily briefly glanced back. The blonde was still staring at them, her face all twisted up. She said something to the librarian, who shot them a look and just shrugged.
"Uh, she's still looking at us."
"I hope she doesn't think we're rude."
Normally that would be exactly what Homulilly feared, but now she wasn't so sure if that was the case. "Hey," she said. "What if she recognizes us too?"
"All right, girls!" Dr. Alice suddenly called, making Homulilly jump a little. "We're moving on!"
…
"Holy shit!"
Homulilly did not know who it was that had cried out when the class entered the Magi's Gifts Emporium. It could have been any one of them, honestly, or even several at once. Maybe it had been herself that had said it. It didn't matter; the impression was shared by all.
The Magi's Gifts Emporium was aptly named. Even in a world carved out of magic, it seemed like walking into a wonderland. The whole store rose two stories high, with the ceiling made from prismatic glass that broke up the sunlight into dazzling colors. Colorful kites and ribbons hung from the ceiling alongside model flying machines and birds delicately woven from glass, crystal, and precious metals. A tiny golden train track wove around the ribbons and the models without a visible means of support, on which a model train chugged contently along.
Directly in front of them were four large glass cases, and each one contained an intricately detailed model city. The one of Freehaven was immediately recognizable, starting with the top of the hill and ending with a carefully painted ocean. But there was also one that depicted what appeared to be a mountain town, full of pine trees and brown houses with green sloping roofs…and a strange but lovely series of crystalline structures made from what looked like woven volcanic glass connected by several glass rails. In another was something that honestly looked like an alien spaceship, made from several round platforms containing all sorts of gracefully curving structures connected by the same kind of glass rails. And another seemed to be a cutaway of an underground city, one of white tunnels and gracefully curving architecture.
And beyond those were the shelves.
There seemed to be no end to them. Shelves upon shelves upon shelves, all towering high, all loaded with things that sparkled, things that glowed, things that moved, and things that made noise. It seemed as if the treasure hoards of every fantasy story had been looted just to stock the store.
"I'm, uh…" Marty said, staring. "Wow. This is…"
"Shiny," Vendel breathed. It was the first time Homulilly had seen her excited. Her eyes were glittering what Homulilly felt a pirate's would upon spying a hoard of gold. Which wouldn't be too far off.
"Lovely, isn't it?" Dr. Alice said. She swept a hand out at the wealth before them. "This is, as you'd imagine, one of the premier destinations of Freehaven. After all, what's the point of having a city of magical girls if your shopping needs were not magical themselves."
"Oh, please, please, please tell me we're going shopping!" Heather exclaimed. "I need this! I absolutely need this!"
"With what money?" Dr. Rizwana said in amusement.
Heather looked like someone had just shot her best friend, so Lillian, her actual best friend, sympathetically patted her shoulder.
"But…we can spend that allowance you talked about earlier here, right?" Vendel said. "I mean, once we get access to the outside."
"Certainly. But I warn you, this place can be a little pricey."
"Oh, that won't be a problem at all," Vendel purred. Homulilly wondered what she meant by that, and if she really wanted to know the answer.
"Fortunately, we can have a look around," Dr. Cynthia said. "So-"
Lucy, Heather, Lillian, and Ava immediately rushed past her. And once they were off, everyone else was too. Even Homulilly couldn't resist hurrying to see the wonders.
"Look at that," Gretchen breathed once they were in the shelves, which rose so high that Homulilly had to crane her neck to see the top. It was honestly hard to figure out what Gretchen was referring to. One section contained a display of what looked like eggs carved from gemstones, though giving the way they were glowing she would not be surprised if they could actually hatch. Another held ornate tea sets that actually stood up and walked around on tiny feet, serving their owners without needing for anything to be picked up. One glassed-in display held what actually looked like tiny dinosaurs moving around a miniaturized version of prehistoric Earth, complete with a tiny volcano. For a moment Homulilly thought that they actually had created shrunk-down dinosaurs, until she saw a sign that said, Ambulatory Toys – Not Actually Alive.
"Whoa," Zhao said, standing next to them. "But, um, how does anyone get the stuff on the high shelves?"
Dr. Rizwana, who was nearby, pointed. "Using those."
Homulilly then saw what looked like steel handholds protruding from the sides of the shelves. "Wait, you have to climb?" she said.
"Uh-huh!"
"But…isn't that…dangerous? I mean, what if you fall, or step on something, or knock it over?"
Dr. Rizwana laughed. "Oh, don't worry! There are so many protective field around the merchandise that you couldn't even scuff them! I would love to see you try to actually break something in here! Actually, don't. It annoys the staff."
That…still didn't seem to be the most practical way of doing things, but Homulilly didn't feel like arguing.
They continued wandering on through the maze of shelves, gawking at everything from floating globs of quicksilver that twisted them into a variety of shapes to bejeweled weapons.
"Homulilly-chan, look at this!" Gretchen suddenly exclaimed.
It was another glassed-in display, this one containing glass kittens, each one a different color. And they were moving: some wandering around the display, some rolling around wrestling, some sleeping, all of them behaving like living kittens.
Ava and Carly were already pressing their faces to the display. "Aw," Carly said, tapping the glass, which attracted the attention of the green kitten. It started pawing at where her finger was touching. "That's so freaking cute!"
"Are they actually alive?" Ava asked.
"Afraid not," Dr. Rizwana remarked. "They're animated by magic to act like actual kittens. They do have something of a mind of their own though."
Gretchen stared longingly at them. "I'd like a kitten. Maybe I could save up?"
"Uh, I don't know." Carly pointed at a list of prices. "That might take a while."
Gretchen paled when she read the prices. "Oh, wow. That's…expensive."
Tapping her lower lip, Homulilly stared thoughtfully at the kittens.
They continued on, moving deeper and deeper. There seemed to be no end of stuff to look at, stuff to dream about.
Suddenly Gabrielle and Amirah came running up to them. "Guys," Amirah said breathlessly. "Get this: they have a mermaid!"
Gretchen immediately lit up. "You mean, one you could buy as a pet, or-"
"No, I mean working here!"
"Ah, you met her," Dr. Cynthia said, coming up to them.
Gabrielle stared. "You knew about this?"
"Relax, she's just a resident. Actually, you should leave her alone. She teaches music classes out of the store, and probably doesn't want anyone disturbing her lesson."
"I…" Then Gabrielle's face fell. "Wow, okay. Mermaids are…normal now. Don't know how I feel about that."
"It does make them feel kind of less special," Amirah said.
Dr. Cynthia shrugged. "Well, even in the stories, mermaids are just people with different anatomy who live in the ocean instead of on land. Though don't be too bummed out. She's the only mermaid I know of."
Homulilly then noticed Gretchen staring toward the back of the store with an odd look on her face. "Come on," she said, tugging on Homulilly's sleeve.
"Gretchen-chan?" Homulilly said, tilting her head.
Gretchen smiled back sheepishly. "I just want to see the mermaid."
"But…Dr. Cynthia said…"
"I'm not going to bother her, I just want to see her! She won't even see me."
Sighing, Homulilly let herself get dragged along.
The two made their way to the other end of the store. There, they found an entire wall covered with musical instruments of every kind, from violins to saxophones to several strange, elegantly carved devices that Homulilly was pretty sure were extraterrestrial. Iris would probably know the name to every single one.
Sure enough, there she was, talking excitedly to a girl that seemed to be about Homulilly and Gretchen's age, a girl wearing a green-and-black striped tee-shirt and a brown newsboy cap. The girl was seated in some kind of futuristic mobile chair, like a wheelchair that had its wheels replaced with four mechanical spider-like legs, which were currently inert, tucked in tightly to the chair. A special kind of harness stretched in in the front of the chair, likely intended to support the owner's lifeless legs.
However, it was evident that this girl wasn't in that chair due to some kind of injury or disability, but because she had no legs at all. Instead, she had a large fish tail stretched out into the harness, one that shimmered with scales of blue, black, green, and maroon, like the sunset on the ocean.
It was a mermaid, a living, breathing mermaid. But while that was very cool, Homulilly suddenly found her eyes drawn not to the girl's tail, but to her face, with round, chubby cheeks, a little button-nose, and wide, friendly eyes of a bright blue. Under her cap her shaggy hair dropped just past her ears and was the same blue hue as her eyes.
"Oh, my God," Gretchen whispered. "Homulilly, it's just like the ribbon girl! Do you know her?"
"I…maybe? She seems really familiar."
"I know! But where do we know her from? I think I'd remember a mermaid!"
Then, almost as if she sensed that she was being watched, the mermaid looked up from her conversation with Iris to stare right at them. As soon as she saw their faces, her eyes went wide.
Homulilly and Gretchen hastily ducked back into the safety of the shelves. "Did you see that?" Gretchen said. "She saw us! She recognized us too!"
"Maybe she was just wondering why we were spying on her."
"No, she recognized us too! I'm sure of-"
"All right, girls!" Dr. Iris called. "Everyone to the front of the store! We're moving on!"
Homulilly and Gretchen exchanged a look. Then, with the sigh, they did as they were told, heading back to the main entrance.
"I do know her from something," Gretchen said stubbornly. "I wish I knew where!"
Homulilly glanced over her shoulder. "Well, they said we can come back on our own. Maybe we'll meet her again."
Gretchen blinked. Then she smiled. "See? I knew you'd want to make friends once we've met the right person!"
Homulilly scowled.
…
This time, the class was led into the city itself, deep into the maze of towering white walls and narrow winding streets.
"It's amazing," Gretchen whispered as she stared up.
From the ground floor, Freehaven seemed to stretch up and up, the whiteness of the walls broken up by arching windows, balconies, even walkways stretching from one building to the other. Some of the windows were decorated with hanging plants, others were colorful strands of silk, others with strings of sparkling crystals, giving it an exotic feel.
"Look, monkeys!" Carly exclaimed, pointing.
Sure enough, a pair of brown monkeys were hanging from one window, idly watching the class pass below.
"Do they belong to someone?" Heather wanted to know.
"Could be," Dr. Cynthia said. "But they might also be wild. We have a lot of wild animals wandering around."
Then Jordan's eyes sparkled in an unpleasant way. Light collected around her right hand, and she was suddenly holding an ornate glaive of gold and blue. "Hey, who wants to see if I can take their tails off?" she said, reaching back to throw.
Everyone near her immediately recoiled in shock. "Whoa, hey!" Linda said, raising her hands and all of her spider legs. "No need for that! They're just monkeys, living their monkey lives!"
"Yeah, what the hell, Jordan?" Ava said in disgust.
"Seriously, that's messed up," Lucy added.
Jordan looked surprised by the negative response. "What?" she said, wilting a bit. "Oh, come on! It was just a joke! I wasn't gonna-"
"Jordan!"
Dr. Rizwana was glowering right at her. "Put that away," she commanded.
Jordan winced. "Whatever," she muttered, and the glaive disappeared.
Moments later they got moving again, though more silently this time, the mood killed. Homulilly and Gretchen shuffled to the other end of the group away from Jordan, who was sulkily staring at the ground.
Even with the damper, the city was still interesting to look at. Despite how narrow the street was, there still were plenty of entrances set in the walls, and occasionally someone, either a Puella Magi or a witch, would come out and be on their way. When that happened, all the girls had to crowd along one wall to let them pass.
"Why is everything so narrow?" Amaya complained. "How does anyone get anywhere like this?"
"Freehaven wasn't built with cars in mind. Most of you probably already know this, but travel in Freehaven isn't usually done on the ground level. After all, we are all magical girls. And we have our own way of getting around."
She paused next to a segment of wall. Set in it was a series of sequential grooves that stretched all the way up to the roof.
"Wait," Vendel said. "That looks like a ladder."
"That's because it is a ladder!" Dr. Alice stuck her right hand and foot into the grooves. "Everybody up!"
As the class all stared, Dr. Alice scrambled up the side of the wall with all the agility and deftness of one of the monkeys they had seen.
"You have got to be kidding me," Vendel said.
"What?" Carly said. "This isn't so bad. I used to climb walls and leap from building to building every night!"
"You did! Me? I spent my entire life cooped up in therapy. All five weeks of it!"
"You still have the same strength and agility," Dr. Cynthia told her. "Believe me, this will be a cakewalk."
"What does that even mean? Who walks around carrying cakes?"
"All right, this is more my speed!" Linda said suddenly. She entwined her fingers, flipped her hands around, and cracked the knuckles. Then she hopped onto the wall and, ignoring the grooves, used the spider legs protruding from her back to carrying her all the way up the wall.
"Oh, that is so disturbing," Amaya said.
Then Lucy pushed her way to the front of the group. "Hey, LINDY!"
Now at the top, Linda leaned over the side of the roof. "Yeah?"
With no warning whatsoever, Lucy pulled her head right off and held it in both hands, making everyone around her recoil in shock. "Catch!"
"Lucy, wait-" Dr. Cynthia started to say, but it was too late. Lucy had already lobbed her head all the way up the side of the building.
"Oh!" Linda hastily grabbed at Lucy's head, but her fingers fumbled. She tried again and again, causing it to bounce off her hands each time. Then in desperation, she thrust out with both hands and all spider legs, finally catching it in a cage. Breathing a sigh of relief, she brought Lucy's head safely away from the edge. "Okay, I got it, Lucy!"
"Dude, you don't have to shout, my ears are up here now! Now, point me down so I can see what I'm doing!"
Down below, the rest of the girls couldn't seem to decide if they were going to stare at the giant spider-girl's conversation with the severed head in her hands or the headless body standing casually among them.
Then Lucy's body rubbed her hands together and grabbed onto the grooves and began ascending. She was a little awkward with her timing at first, but she soon fell into a rhythm and shot up the side almost as quick as Dr. Alice, and soon she was standing with Dr. Alice and Linda at the top, placing her head back onto her shoulders.
Then Brittney stepped forward. "Okay," she said, lowering herself down into a sprinter's stance. "If she can do it headless, then so can I! But only, um, not headless. Because I can't take off my head. Yeah, that's what I meant."
She shot up the side of the wall, not even bothering with the grooves until she was at least three meters up, and was soon up with the others.
Then Carly stepped forward. "Okay, this'll be easy," she said. "Just like old times!"
It was, and after she had gone up another did as well, and then another, and another.
"C'mon, Homulilly-chan!" Gretchen said, tugging at Homulilly's arm. She started to move forward, only to stop when she realized that Homulilly hadn't move.
"Hmmm?" Gretchen turned toward her friend. "What's wrong?"
Homulilly stared up at the vertical wall, nearly cowering beneath its height. It was too tall, and the grooves too shallow, and she knew that she was too weak. "I c-can't," she said. "It's…I can't!"
She wasn't the only one. The small American girl, Shiloh, was also hanging back. "I…I don't know," she said. "My town didn't really have any tall buildings. I've never climbed up anything this size!"
Then Dr. Cynthia was there. "It's okay, Homulilly," she said, laying a hand on Homulilly's shoulders. "You can."
"But-"
Dr. Cynthia's motorcycle-headlight eyes shined warmly. "You're not weak at all. This will be as easy as stepping onto a curve."
She gently led Homulilly over to the grooves. "Now, just trust me. Place one hand in here." Though she was still shaking, Homulilly complied, sticking her right hand into one of the grooves.
"Okay, now put your right foot in here."
Homulilly did so.
Dr. Cynthia placed her hands on Homulilly's waist. "Now, push up!"
Realizing that she had absolutely no way of backing out and that all eyes were now upon her, Homulilly squeezed her eyes shut, gritted her teeth, and pushed up with her leg and arm.
To her absolutely surprise, she almost flew right up the side of the wall, and would have done just that had Dr. Cynthia not been holding onto her waist.
Gasping, Homulilly looked over her shoulder to see Dr. Cynthia smiling at her. "See?" she said. "You are strong."
"I…"
"A magical girls gain superhuman strength, speed, and agility, and those attributes are not lost when you become a witch. You're just as strong and fast as everyone else."
"I…I am?"
"Of course you are!" Gretchen said. "Remember saving me when we were on that clock? Remember how you were able to pull me back up?"
Homulilly didn't answer. She had always just assumed that, even in a world of magic, she would be the untalented one, the one lagging far behind everyone else.
"Now, let's climb," Dr. Cynthia said.
"Hold on!"
Gretchen suddenly bounded forward, clearing both of their heads, and clung to the wall right over Homulilly, holding onto the grooves with both hands and ten of her twelve legs. The other two reached down and wrapped themselves around Homulilly's shoulders. "Now you definitely won't fall!"
"Ready?" Dr. Cynthia said.
Homulilly took a deep breath. Then she nodded.
The hardest part of the ascent was the first few seconds, but it didn't take long for Homulilly to realize that she wasn't struggling at all. In fact, it was as easy as climbing shallow steps. She pushed up, and she went up, with no exertion at all. Her body, which had been trembling so hard beforehand, now seemed to remember having done this a hundred times. Sure, Gretchen's support helped, but she was pretty sure that she could have made the climb even without it.
The wall had seemed impossibly tall from the bottom, and yet the actual climb took less than fifteen seconds, and soon she, Gretchen, and Dr. Cynthia all had pulled themselves up onto the roof with everyone else.
To Homulilly's relief, most of the rest of the girls hadn't been watching her fight her fear, and those who had, specifically Zhao, Ava, and Linda just smiled and clapped encouragingly.
"Great job!" Linda said. "See? Easy, wasn't it?"
"Uh, yeah," Homulilly breathed, holding a hand to her chest. "It was. But…whew."
Behind them, Shiloh came up as well with Dr. Rizwana's help.
"Wow," she said, her legs wobbling. "I really didn't know how strong I was."
"You still don't," Dr. Rizwana said. "Trust me, there's plenty that you're going to learn about what you can do."
"Really?" Shiloh said with a shy smile. "Well, that's-" Then she caught sight of what the rest of the group was staring at. "-ooooooooh, wooooooooooow!"
Homulilly had noticed too. As had Gretchen. They stood hand-in-hand, staring out in mute wonder.
The skyline of Freehaven stretched out before them, and Homulilly finally understood why the roofs were made flat. The buildings had all been constructed more-or-less on a compatible level, practically forming steps all the way up the hill. And on those rooftops was a whole other city.
There were public gardens were people mulled around together. There were small business set up on top of the larger buildings, from little eateries to shops. There were courts for various sports. There were swimming pools, small parks, and public gathering places. There were even street signs set on building corners to let people know where they were.
And then there were the people themselves. It turned out that the reason the narrow streets weren't as crowded as expected is that everyone was out on top. Homulilly saw plenty of girls milling around on the roofs while others traveled from place to place by running and jumping from roof to roof, clearing the distance more quickly than any vehicle could.
"So that's how people get around!" Vendel said. "Huh."
Claudia scratched her head and frowned. "Won't your legs get tired after a while?"
"Actually, no," Dr. Alice said. "Your stamina has been magically increased as well. A trip downtown won't exhaust you anymore than a stroll to the street corner would." Then she smiled. "So, you girls ready to go traveling?"
Suddenly all the pride Homulilly had felt from scaling the wall was drowned in the ice water that now flooded her stomach. "We're going to…jump from building to building?" she said.
"We're not going far." Dr. Alice pointed to an open plaza on one rooftop a little less than half-a-kilometer away. "And honestly, the gaps are so short you could probably jump them even without super strength."
"Be sure to obey the rules though," Dr. Rizwana said. "Keep to the edges of the roofs, make way for other people, and keep in formation!"
Then Dr. Alice turned to Gretchen. "Gretchen, you look like you're the springiest. Care to take the lead?"
"Me?" Gretchen said, perking up.
"I, uh…" Then Gretchen glanced to Homulilly and saw the pleading in her eyes. "No, thank you. I'm fine."
"Oh, can I?" Lucy said.
Dr. Cynthia frowned. "Is this going to involve throwing your head."
"I mean, it might."
"Then no, you may not."
"Oh, for God's sake," Amaya sighed as she stepped forward. "I used to do this shit all the time. I'll go."
She hunkered down and then took off running along the edge of the rooftop they were on. A few meters from the end she took a bounding leap, sailing across the gap, and landed on her feet halfway across the next roof and, without missing a step, was again running.
A few more bounds, and she was standing in the plaza.
"All right, let's go!" Zhao shot off after her, Lucy following close behind. Soon the whole class was leaping from roof to roof.
"C'mon, Homulilly-chan!" Gretchen said. "I don't think I can hold onto you for this one though."
"No, it's fine," Homulilly said. She took a deep breath. "I can…" She closed her eyes and mentally steadied herself. "Okay. I can do this."
Enough of the other girls had already gone to give her a clear path. Homulilly crouched down, calculated the distance in her head, and pushed off into a sprint.
She hadn't done any running…well, pretty much ever, so she wasn't sure how fast she actually was. Despite the ease of her climb, she still half-expected to run out of breath and fall to the ground with cramps in seconds.
Instead, she shot forward so fast that it kind of surprised her, enough that she almost forgot to jump until she was practically at the edge.
When she saw how close she was to running right over the ledge, she panicked, and leapt purely out of instinct.
For one brief, terrifying second she was sailing through the air, higher than she ever thought that she could go, arms and legs flailing while her mouth hung open in a silent scream.
Then the next rooftop rushed up to meet her, and Homulilly suddenly realized that she wasn't preparing to land. She closed her eyes and braced for impact.
The world then spun around in a very strange way, and she felt something slide past her back and shoulders, and the next thing she knew she was…not lying in a painful heap from a bad landing. In fact, she seemed to be fine.
Homulilly opened her eyes. She was crouched on the next roof, one leg with the knee bent and the other braced beneath her.
Huh?
"Are you okay?" Gretchen said, appearing next to her.
Homulilly blinked up at her. "What happened?"
"Uh, well, you jumped really high, and when you landed, you did this sort of really cool rolling thing over your shoulders and came up like that!"
"I…did?"
Homulilly slowly rose up to her feet. She looked down at her gloved hands. "What…What did I…"
Then she saw Dr. Cynthia standing nearby, arms folded as she smiled at her.
"Your body remembers," she said. "Even if your head doesn't. You used to do that sort of thing all the time, probably."
"I did?"
"Sure! I mean, putting everything about the Incubators aside, you were basically a superhero. And you still have most of your powers."
"A superhero?" Homulilly had a sudden image of herself in spandex and capes, leaping from building to building. It was…admittedly silly, but also kind of cool.
"You ready to keep going?" Dr. Cynthia said. Homulilly nodded.
This time, now that she knew that she could clear the gaps with ease, Homulilly chose her path a little more cautiously, not running as fast and taking the jumps in short hops instead of great leaps. It was a little slower than her classmates, but soon she was standing among them, having made the run with as much ease as she had the climb.
"That was fun!" Gretchen gushed. "People really just run across rooftops to get places?"
"Basically," Dr. Cynthia told her as she straightened out her FIB caretaker uniform. "You can take the lower routes if you want, but it is much slower."
Homulilly had to admit, she felt a little giddy as well. That had been exhilarating! She now kind of hoped that they would get to do it again so she could see if she could keep up with the others.
Once everyone was gathered in the middle of the plaza, Dr. Alice clapped her hands to get everyone's attention. "Now, girls," she said. "I know you've all had a lot thrown at you these last few days."
"Oh, yeah," Carly said.
"You can probably say that again," Vendel said dryly.
Dr. Alice nodded. "But there is one thing we've been holding off with until now, an aspect of the afterlife that just as important and just as strange any anything else. And that is-"
"The aliens!" Iris exclaimed. She rose up and down on the balls of her feet and clapped her hands excitedly. "You mean the aliens, right?"
"I do indeed," Dr. Alice said with a nod. "After all, the afterlife is for all who were victimized by the Incubators, regardless of species. And the Incubators contacted several species, so we have a lot of neighbors!" She looked around at everyone's expectant faces. "Would you like to meet one?"
"YYYEEEEESSSSSSSS!" Iris predictably responded.
"Oh, hell yes!" Lucy exclaimed.
"Yes!" Brittney said. "Absolutely. Yes!"
"Then turn around," Dr. Alice suggested.
Homulilly blinked. She hadn't heard anyone else arrive.
"Oooooh myyyyyyyy GAAAAAWD!" Iris squealed.
Reluctantly Homulilly turned with everyone else to see what Iris was so excited about.
There, floating a little over a meter above the ground, was a glowing green sphere. It was about half again as large as a basketball and semi-translucent, with what looked like swirling gasses inside. Sparkling multicolored dots were all over its surface, as if it had been splashed with glitter.
"Hello!" the sphere "said," its high-pitched voice cheerful, crystalline, and entirely inhuman. "It's nice to meet you-"
"IT'S A CALLIOPE!" Iris shrieked. She immediately rushed up to the sphere and began running all around it, her eyes whirring with excitement. "Oh, I have so many questions! Is it true that your species lives entirely on water vapor? How does a gaseous lifeform evolve in the first place? Do all the floating crystals on your home planet indicate that it was once solid at some point in its past? Is it true that you invented a style of music made entirely through the bending of light-waves through said crystals?"
"Yes, we do!" said the sphere, sounding as happy to speak with Iris as Iris was to speak with it. "But we also derive nourishment from microscopic minerals in the water vapor. From single-celled bacteria that used to grow on the crystals. That's the prevailing theory! And there's actually a lot more involving sound waves, but basically, yes we did."
"So…hold on," Vendel said, her ball-shaped face twisting up in confusion. "This is an alien?"
"Vendel!" Lillian said with a gasp. "Don't be rude."
"Eh, well, yes and no," said the calliope. "If I were alive and visiting your home planet of Earth, then yes, I would be. And I suppose I technically count as one in here, as this is a human territory. But since this afterlife is for all magical girls from all over the universe, then I'm as much a native as you are!"
"EEEEEEEEEEEEEE!" Iris shrieked with delight.
Homulilly remained silent. She knew about calliopes, of course. She had even seen quite a few flying past the windows. But she had never been interested enough to actually study up on them. All she knew was that they looked like Christmas tree ornaments, they got around through flying, and apparently they had been friends with humans for a very long time.
"Okay girls," Dr. Alice said, walking up to the sphere. "This here is an old friend of mine. Meet, and I swear I am not making this up, Bellyache."
"Bellyache?" Amaya said, her jaw dropping. "Your name is Bellyache?"
Shiloh gawked at her in shock. "Hey! Don't be rude!"
"Oh, don't worry about it," the calliope said. "Yup! It is Bellyache! And nope! I wasn't aware of the definition when I chose it, but I have been made aware since. But I kept it since it's funny."
"Wait, you chose your name?" Brittney said, scratching the back of her neck.
"Oh, I know this one!" Iris said, waving her hand as she hopped up and down. "It's because calliope names are actually completely incomprehensible in any known human language, so they all chose backup names when interacting with other species! And since humans were the first they ever met, they traditionally use human words for their backup names!"
"Exactly! And in my defense, they just gave us a list of human words to choose from, and I went with the one that sounded the nicest. They didn't include definitions!"
"Oooh," Brittney said, her eyes glimmering with interest. "So what would you real name sound like?"
Bellyache responded with a bizarre sound that sounded like a shrill rapid-fire mash-up of wind chimes and water drops into a crystal glass. A few of the girls winced, Homulilly among them.
"Oh, wow," Linda said, rubbing her head. "I see what you mean. I wouldn't know how to begin even thinking that name, much less pronouncing it!"
However, as everyone excitedly asked Bellyache question after question, Homulilly actually found her eyes drawn to something else.
A parrot was flying overhead, a scarlet macaw. That in itself wasn't unusual, as parrots were pretty common in Freehaven. In addition to the one that had cursed them out in the garden, Homulilly often saw exotic birds of all kinds flying free. But something about this one was grabbing Homulilly's attention.
She watched the parrot's path as it sailed past, heading for another rooftop not far from where the group was gathered. There, it dropped down to land on an outstretched arm, one covered by a red sleeve.
There was a girl sitting on a bench on that roof, a girl wearing what looked to be a tailored bright red pantsuit, complete with slacks, a blazer, and shiny red shoes. She had on a wide-brimmed red hat tilted forward at a jaunty angle, and, as far as Homulilly could tell, no hair underneath. Once the parrot was perched on her arm, she brought it into her lap and started speaking to it in low tones while scratching its neck.
Homulilly frowned. She had plenty of weirder looking people wearing even more eccentric outfits and hadn't given them a second look. But there was just something about this girl in particular that gripped her attention and refused to let go, something so tantalizingly familiar. It was the same feeling she had when noticing the blonde with the ribbons or the blue-haired mermaid, that persisten sense of déjà vu.
"You see her too?" Gretchen said in a low voice.
"Yeah."
"And you feel it too?"
Homulilly nodded. "I do."
"Huh. That's the third girl today. I wonder what that's all about?"
Homulilly shrugged. It seemed like there was something weird and inexplainable around every corner.
Then, just as the other two strangely familiar girls had done, the girl in red seemed to sense that she was being watched, and turned to look directly at them. And despite the distance between them, Homulilly could tell that her eyes were the same bright red as her outfit.
The red girl titled her head and frowned, and Homulilly and Gretchen hastily looked away.
"She recognizes us," Gretchen said.
"Yeah," Homulilly said. "So did the other two. Why do you think that is?"
Gretchen shook her head. "I don't know. But I think we'd better find out."