Fate/Kaleid Liner Prisma Taylor

Well, that had escalated quickly.

I'd been flying over the city and had encountered the robed form of E88's Rune, standing on what looked like part of a car that was floating in the sky. She apparently wasn't up to something and I'd almost managed to convince her to just go home, but something or other had set her off.

Which is why I found myself dodging an expensive looking car as it was hurled at me by a telekinetic neo-nazi. I'm not even sure where it came from because we weren't currently in a wealthy neighborhood or anything. Rune was dangerous because she had mobility and range. So did I, but I couldn't exactly fight back as I was without risking a good deal of property damage or seriously hurting Rune… I reached into my holster and drew out a card. I'd be loose mobility, and I'd have to be careful, but I'd gain in versatility and battlefield control and that was more important right now.

I saw the young villain up in the air on a piece of miscellaneous debris, looking for something else to throw, and used the opening to use the card. "Install: Lancer!"

Considering Lancer's state of dress when I'd fought her in the mirror world, I'd felt it prudent to try her Install at home, behind locked doors… and try out some small applications of runic magic while I was at it. I've got to say, I was quite happy with the result.

The pulsing mana and magic circles cleared, revealing that my Princess costume had been replaced with a snug, dark purple ensemble that hugged my body tightly and covered me from head to toe. My hair was pulled back into a long, tightly braided tail, no tiara, a cloth mask covered my mouth and nose, metal pauldrons at my shoulders, and a loose, flowing skirt of the same cloth covered me from hips to mid-thigh. My arms were sealed into sleeves that seamlessly turned into gloves, and I was wearing what seemed to be purple, metal-armored high heels, but neither was anywhere as big a problem as you might think. A Gae Bolg, one of many Lancer could summon, appeared in my hand. I spun the long spear of red, metallic bone behind my back, two full rotations, before thrusting it out and swinging it up, cleaving a piece of concrete in half.

The pieces landed harmlessly on either side of me. I looked up to Rune, smiling behind my mask. We made eye contact, and I lifted my left hand and made the 'bring it' gesture. The teen was surrounded by telekinetically lifted chunks of concrete, wooden planks, and what appeared to be part of a chain link fence-where we near a construction site? No, I need to focus. The villain threw the segment of fencing at me, but I jumped up onto it and used it as a launch pad to jump up and strike at Rune with the broadside of my spear.

The black-and-red-robed villain lost her balance trying to avoid my strike and nearly fell from her perch. As it was, she lost her grip on the debris, and I was able to step up unto the car frame she stood on and draw a few runes of my own in the air in front of her chest. A touch of will, a bit of mana, and a whisper of what I'm pretty sure is Gaelic and the same runes appeared in glowing white light on Rune's body, causing her, and by extension the wrecked vehicle we were standing on to slowly sink to the ground.

"What in Helheim?" Oh, God. She was one of those Neo-Nazis.

"Oh, you know," I began before casually backflipping a dozen feet back, "just a little Celtic magic."

It was hard to tell because of the hood the wizardly themed villain was wearing, but I got the impression that she was glaring at me as she stepped off of the piece of car she'd been riding and hurled it at me.

I casually countered with the conjuring of a few more runes, which turned to fire and blasted the ruined vehicle apart.

"The fuck was that!?" the villain shouted.

I rolled my eyes. "Magic runes, Rune, do try to keep up."

"Bullshit! That was Elder Futhark," the villain yelled with genuine anger in her voice, "you were using Irish trash-runes before. You can't just mix them up however you want!"

I laughed, "I can do whatever I want." I dodged a two by four. "See, I'm the magus, and you're the Hitler Youth reject co-opting an ancient culture to make yourself feel better about being afraid of people with a teensy bit more skin-pigment than you do." A swing of my spear destroyed a chunk of concrete. "I think I'm just a bit more qualified to say how runic magic works than you are."

"Technically," Opal's voice rang out from my right pauldron, "you're not quite a magus-there's more to it than just studying and using magecraft, you know."

"Not the time Opal," I said in reply.

"You little bitch!" The teen villain shouted. I think I touched a nerve. Well, at least I knew what I'd done to piss her off this time. "I bet you're a fucking hebe, too!"

At first, I was confused, but then it clicked: "I'm not Jewish," I said in reply to her slur. "But even if I was, well, hath not a Jew eyes?" My mother was an English professor. When I was younger, I'd sometimes sit in on her classes. Thus, I was more or less obligated to quote Shylock's speech from The Merchant of Venice in this situation.

"The fuck's that supposed to mean!?"

I blinked. "Read a book sometime, will you?"

Rune crouched down and did something to the asphalt below her feet, marking it with her hand, before standing back and ripping a huge chunk of the street, roughly the size of a person, out of the road and sending it high up into the sky. I think she was planning to crush me with it, but she was leaving herself wide open to a counter attack. I could have just taken her out if I'd wanted to, but where would the fun be in that?

The large mass of asphalt was high up in the sky, well clear of even the highest part of the city's skyline. I'd doubt that I'd even be able to see it if I wasn't using Lancer's install… I didn't need to worry about collateral damage this way.

I leaned back and turned, prepared to toss my spear straight up, and began focusing on it and channeling mana into it in preparation for one of its uses.

Rune took notice of my spear's red glow. "What?"

I didn't answer her. Rather, when I had a nice fiery cone of red light, I tossed my spear straight into the sky. "Gae Bolg..." I said, and as the spear pierced the hunk of street that she'd been planning to crush me with, I finished, "Alternative!"

The piece of asphalt was completely consumed as the space around it was warped and filled with a spherical orange explosion.

"Thank you," I said to Rune as she stared at me, mouth agape. "I've been wanting to test that out for a while now but I was always worried about collateral damage." I casually held out a hand to catch the Gae Bolg as it fell from the sky. "I really hope that anybody who was watching enjoyed the show, I know I did."

Rune responded by flinging everything she'd marked right at me. Rather than counter with spells, I summoned a dozen other Gae Bolg and sent them flying, piercing or destroying each projectile before they could make contact.

"How dare you-" I didn't let the Neo-Nazi finish. Instead, I threw my Original Gae Bolg at her, right between her legs, knocking her over and pinning her to the ground by her robe. "Fuck you, you piece of shit! You whore! You-" I tuned her out after that.

I made to walk over to double check that I didn't hit her legs and cut her or anything, but I collapsed to my knees after a single step. I took a moment to catch my breath, and my breathing came out a bit harder than I'd have expected a few minutes ago. I'd made a mistake, I'd forgotten that Opal couldn't replenish my mana when I was using an Install and that Noble Phantasm used up a lot of it. Heh, it was worth it.

I pushed myself up and checked to make sure I didn't knick one of Rune's arteries or something… Yeah, no blood, so I guess…

It was at that time that I realized that I had no idea what to do with a villain I'd defeated. Was, was I supposed to call it in? I didn't have a cell phone, we didn't really believe in them at home since Mom's accident. I started looking around to see if I could find a pay phone when I noticed that someone was watching me.

Standing atop a building that had seen better days was a feminine figure in a tight, black outfit with metal armor and gauntlets, wrapped in a hooded cloak of dark grey urban camo, her face concealed by a black metal mask with a stern expression. She was holding a crossbow in each hand and staring right at me.

It took me a second to realize who it was, but then I waved and called out: "Hey, Shadow Stalker, right!?" The dark figure didn't respond. "Look, um… You're a Ward, right? Could you maybe call this in for me." I pointed to Rune. Still no response. "Oh, um, sorry. I'm Princess, I'm a hero." Shadow Stalker cocked her head to the left, then turned around. She turned into a mass of gas and shadow and floated away.

"Okay then." That was… Okay, that was rude. I checked Rune again, she was still pinned but she was struggling. "Cut that out," I said in my most authoritative voice, my heels clicking as I walked towards her. "You? You're probably going to juvie, and you'll probably have to share it with minority offenders. I really hope that someone will properly educate you on why your philosophy is a load of horse shit."

"Language, Princess," Opal chastised. I rolled my eyes.

"Now, you stay put, I'm gonna go find a pay phone so I can call someone to take you in, okay?"

Rune responded by calling me what I assume to have been a slur. And looking up at me, smugly.

"What? Do you think you're going to get away?" I asked. "You're not. I just took you down without getting a scratch. The only time I exerted myself at all was when I was showing off and having fun." I laughed, I was starting to get into the role. "You're going away for a long time, and nobody is going to rescue you, either, since you're just one angry, bitter, scared, stupid kid among thousands that Kaiser has on tap."

Rune replied by cursing me out and screaming while struggling impotently to free herself from the spear pinning her to the street. I ignored her and started looking up and down the street for any sign of a payphone. Nothing on this street. I ran up and around a building to peak into the next street over. No payphones. I went to check the street opposite, only to catch a glimpse of Rune literally tearing off her robe to get free. I was far up the street from where she was. I took off running after her, but by the time I was halfway to her she'd managed to rip up another platform of asphalt and start flying away on it, heading towards the towers. She turned back to flip me off just as she cleared my line of sight. I stomped in frustration.

I slowed down to a walk and, where I got to where the torn robe was still pinned, surrounded by two huge divots in the street, and plucked the Gae Bolg from the street before reverting the Install.

"Princess," Opal began, "Are you?"

"I'm fine," I said… Okay, I was kind of disappointed that my first major win ended with the baddie getting away, but I'd get her next time. "Let's go home."

I took off and started flying towards home. "I think I'm going to have to get a cell phone or something," I said after a moment, "so that that doesn't happen again."

"You know," Opal explained, "this probably isn't the best time to say this, but I could probably tap into this Earth's communication networks, and then I'd be able to use my communicator function to call people for you."

I sighed. "Now you tell me."

F/KLPT

I was sitting on the couch sketching runes in a notebook. I figured that if I could learn a little bit of magecraft that I could do on my own, then maybe I'd have a backup plan if I couldn't use a card or get to Opal. Dad had gotten an odd look on his face when I'd told him what I was doing.

I caught the phone ringing and got up to answer. "Hello, Hebert residence."

"Taylor," came the voice of my cape friend from the other end, "It's Vicky, you wanna go patrolling with me tonight?"

"I'd love to," I said truthfully, "but I can't. I'm going to see a movie with a friend tonight, so..."

"A friend," Vicky replied, "or a friend?"

I was glad that she couldn't see me blush over the phone. "Just a friend."

"Okay, okay... By the way, that big orange explosion last weekend…?"

"Yeah," I admitted, "that was me. Wanted to test something out and a villain gave me a chance to do so without collateral damage." There was a tone, "Oh, hang on a second, someone's on the other line." I switched over and answered, "hello, Hebert Residence."

"Taylor," came Brian's voice, "I'm going to have to cancel on you for tonight."

"...Why?"

And then he explained it to me. Once he'd hung up, I switched back to Vickey.

"Change of plans. You wanna help me try and find a runaway before she gets hurt?"

F/KLPT

"So, what's this girl look like again?" Glory Girl asked as she flew beside me.

"Black, thirteen or fourteen," I began, "pretty, um, developed, blonde streak in her hair, dresses really trashy." I lept from the roof of one building to another.

"Got it," she replied, "and um… One more question."

"Shoot."

"Can I pet you?"

I stopped in my tracks, my ear twitching, and I turned back to glare at her. "Not the time, Geegee."

"But Foxy-Princess is so cute," Glory Girl explained, "I want to pick you up and carry you around in my purse."

I was starting to regret Installing Caster for this mission.

"Look, we're looking for a young girl and we're trying to find her before the violent racists, drug pushers, and human traffickers do. Can we table this discussion until after we find Aisha?" Aisha was Brian's sister, she'd run away from home, not for the first time from what Brian had said.

"Sorry, sorry," Vicky said. Then her grin turned playful, "but still, why go all foxy on me?"

"Because Caster feels weird," I explained, "and I need to get used to it. Besides," I pointed to my ears, "I figure that these might come in handy when trying to find someone."

Speak of the devil: My right ear twitched. I turned and picked it up-four people running, panicked breathing, cursing… something about a little bitch. "This way!"

I took off running and lept across two rooftops before dropping into an alley between three grown men and the young girl they were chasing.

"Stop right there, criminal scum!" I shouted. Everyone stopped running. "What do we have here," I asked rhetorically, "three grown men chasing a young girl?"

The three men, a white one, a black one, and someone who was either mixed race or a dark latino, were dressed in filthy, wrinkled clothing-the white man wasn't even wearing shoes. They had greying hair and all of them were thin, wrinkled and had bags under their eyes. The white man smiled wide and I saw that he only had five yellow teeth and was drooling like crazy. It took me a moment, but the three men all had a stench about them, as though none of them had bathed in weeks.

"The little bitch, she came up out of nowhere, yeah," he said excitedly. "Spooked my friends and me, made us drop our crystal, fell down a sewer, yeah." His voice was unusually high. "This was good shit, yeah, real expensive. She owes us. If she don't got money, she can pay us back other ways. Her clothes look expensive, and people in this town are always looking for the right kind of company, yeah." My skin crawled at the implication of the junky's statement.

"Yeah, not gonna happen," I said authoritatively, "now you can either turn around and leave or I'll be forced to make you."

The three men all proceeded to charge at me. I briefly wondered how much of the meth they'd taken before they'd dropped it. I grabbed the spokesman of the group by the arm and flipped him onto his back. The black man was knocked down with a punch to the chest, and the third junky was dispatched with a sandaled heel right in the family jewels. All in all, it took me perhaps five seconds to take the three men down. Having learned my lesson from Rune, I summoned three of Caster's paper talismans and, placing one on each prone meth-head, worked a simple curse to rob each man of their strength for a few hours.

It was then that Glory Girl managed to catch up with me. She took one good look at the downed men, then landed and faced me. "Wow, save some for me why don't you?"

"Sorry," I said in reply to her deadpan, "civilian in danger, hero instincts going off. I'm sure you know how it go-YIP!"

The girl behind me had firmly grasped my tail and given it a sharp tug.

"Hey," she said, "it's real."

I snatched my poor abused tail back and hugged it protectively before turning my gaze to the girl. "Yes, it's real. How would you like it if I just grabbed and yanked part of-Oh." The girl was black, young, thirteen or fourteen, pretty, far more developed than I was, with a blonde streak in her hair, and dressed far trashier than she has any right to be.

"Huh," Glory Girl said, "that was easy."

"Aisha Laborn?" I asked, "there are people at home who are worried about you."

"Yeah right," she began. Then she paused and looked at me. "They don't normally send capes after runaway kids, especially not ones who've been gone for less than a day." She looked me right in the eyes. "How do you know me?"

"Uh..." I did not think that through. At all.

"Wait a second," the girl continued, "long black curly hair, big brown eyes, tall, cute, kinda scrawny… You're Brian's new girlfriend!"

"I'm not his girlfriend!" I shouted in instinct… Then the realization of what I just said and did caught up with me. "Oh fuck."

"Language, Princess," Chastised Opal from Caster's mirror.

Aisha proceeded to start laughing uncontrollably.

"You see," Glory Girl added, "this is one of the reasons why New Wave doesn't have Secret Identities."

"Thank you, peanut gallery," I deadpanned to the blonde hero, "now look," I said, pointing to Aisha, "you can't tell anyone about this, understand."

"Relax," she said between bouts of laughter, "It's funnier," she was struggling to breathe, "it's funnier if Brian doesn't know he's dating a Superhero." I was going to question why, but I thought better of it.

"Okay then, just so we're clear." I took a deep breath. "Now, are you going to go home, or are we going to have to take you home?"

The younger girl looked thoughtful for a moment, "Okay. I'll go back to my dad's house… If you let me touch your ears."

I blinked. "Seriously?"

"Seriously."

I sighed and knelt down. "Just get it over with."

Having foxy ears does not make getting scratched behind them feel any better than it would normally. Mostly it just felt weird and was really awkward and embarrassing. When Aisha was done, Glory Girl agreed to fly her home, mostly so I didn't have to risk being recognized by anyone else in Brian's family. Before she left, however, she pulled a cell phone and called the police to deal with the three meth-heads. I moved the drug addicts onto a sidewalk and waited until the police arrived, handed them over, answered a few questions, and went home, all while trying not to think too hard about the fact that Brian apparently thought I was cute.