"Kaval sviri, mamo. Gore, dole, mamo. Gore, dole, mamo. / Kaval sviri, mamo. Gore, dole, mamo, pod seloto."
- Bulgarian folk song
"So! Everyone, this way, follow the beat. / So! Tap your heels, follow the path that makes your heart dance. / So! Everyone, this way, follow the beat. / So! Tap your heels, follow the path that makes your heart dance. Hop on the mirage and dance this twisted world away."
- Belle
"I don't like you because you're dangerous."
- Val Kilmer
"This is the king's highway, and I advise you and your men to make way!"
- The Patriot
"Hey! Well, my temperature's rising, and my feet on the floor. Crazy people knocking 'cause they're wanting some more. / Let me in, baby, I don't know what you got. But you better take it easy, this place is hot."
- The Spencer Davis Group
"ICE CREAM?!"
- Tom Cruise
A dogfight was about to break out in the airspace high above the palace. Two glittering flecks—one black, and one red—idly hovered next to each other six miles up in the bright blue sky.
The Ultimate Black Diamond stared across at what would surely be her next conquest: The Beautiful Red Cassiterite. The two Meister Otomes weren't evenly matched. They weren't even partially matched. In fact, they were more like polar opposites of each other.
"You better hold it, Miss!" the Cassiterite exclaimed from twenty feet away. "My Master's not going to like you invading his borders!"
Is this girl serious? Nina silently asked herself. She was used to facing noble warriors who stood proudly in opposition, and gentle peacekeepers who were pushed into battles they wanted to avoid. But not… whatever this was. If nothing else, the Cassiterite certainly knew how to take a life-or-death situation in stride.
Nina could recite all the intel on this Meister by heart. His Majesty's Imperial Consort, Mia Sou. née Mia Raki. Born A.R. 314. Nineteen years old. Country of origin: Konala. Classifications: Speed, evasion, close-range, light armor. Element: Double Zhuque Duster. Graduated from Garderobe three years ahead of Nina. Final class ranking: Trias #3. Actually ranked Pearl #4 overall for most of her senior year and never would have qualified for Trias, but the #1 in her class had to take an extended leave due to illness. Her absence moved everyone else up a rank.
Great. Just the kind of Otome that Nina despised. Someone who had everything conveniently work out for her when she wasn't even trying.
Floating in place, Mia carefully turned in her flight rings until her back was completely facing the ground and she was gazing at Nina upside-down. She held her position completely relaxed, as if she were sprawled over backwards on an invisible hammock and kicking her legs in the air. She was just a heavenly body, as weightless as a feather and passively allowing the forces of science to swirl around her. Nina expected her to start blowing bubblegum at any moment.
The Beautiful Red Cassiterite Robe was a dress fit for royalty. It was predominantly red (as the name suggested), with a little silk white along the torso and legs, and threaded with dignified gold trim all over. Ruffled faux-feather patterns covered her shoulders and hips. The legs were cut to resemble formfitting shorts, with narrow white and gold garter "veins" traveling down her knees to connect the larger flight ring around her waist to the smaller ones on her ankles. The arms were sleeveless, but similar "veins" traveled over her elbows to connect her gloves and wrist rings to the faux-feathers on her shoulder armor. The overall design gave the impression of an exotic Tang Dynasty romper equipped with anti-grav units.
The Otome wearing the Robe was, surprisingly, not a straight redhead. Her hair was dark reddish-brown and tied in two buns above her ears.
Is she trying to be a phoenix, or a mouse? Nina shook her head as she thought to herself.
"You're at a loss for words over my radiant appearance!" the Cassiterite happily announced. Well, she wasn't completely wrong. "You can't keep your eyes off of my crimson grandeur, hm?" The sound left the Otome's smiling lips like a high-pitched chirp. "Don't ya just wanna eat me up?"
On the contrary, Nina felt like she was going to barf. This was Arika a couple years older, not the slightest bit more mature, and married into a noble family.
"So who do I get to play with today? Another Schwarz crony? Another ninja from Zipang? One of Shizuru's cats?" Mia quickly rotated herself in the air so she was oriented belly-down while maintaining the same vertical height. Anyone standing on the ground with binoculars would have gotten a great view of her front ruffles. "Who do you represent, Little Sister Diamond?"
"Myself. Your true queen," Nina uttered in a voice that had no time for insolence. She planned on finding out if Mia was as red on the inside as she proclaimed to be on the outside, before she and her precious Konalan emperor started to sparkle green.
"Ah. I see." Mia nodded jubilantly. "I'm being paid a visit by the Wacko Person from Crazyville. And I will be your Honorary Custodian, Mia. How would you like your room prepared, Lady Dementia?"
What culture would want to be represented by this airhead? What ruler would trust his kingdom, his life, in the hands of someone so pompous? The compassionless Ultimate Black Diamond found it all to be a waste, and it was made even worse when she considered there were probably people in the kingdom below who actually cheered for this brat.
"She's happy because she's in love!" they'd say. "She's happy because she knows how much we appreciate her!" The people who praised this Otome would probably describe her mannerisms as charming, spunky, adorable, and a little bit sassy. Nina's only word for her was insufferable.
The one thing that made Nina a little cautious about her was how she always wielded her twin Elements with meticulous skill. They were basically two stacks of giant curved knives that unfolded like ornamental fans, and being able to move them around with coordinated grace wasn't exactly an easy feat. Was her "bubbly innocent optimist" demeanor just an act she was putting on to throw Nina off her guard?
Mia rotated her position again so she was standing on the air with one ankle tucked behind the other. She held her fully expanded Elements in an arch behind her waist, whisking her sporty hips in somewhat of a dance rhythm so she resembled a peacock proudly displaying its plumage.
Whatever caution Nina had been starting to feel toward the Cassiterite immediately faded. The poor thing was too dumb to realize only boy peacocks had those feathers. Although, maybe it was supposed to represent how she was an extension of the emperor?
"Well, aren'tcha gonna fight me, Neeners?" the Beautiful Red Cassiterite asked with bright teeth. "Or are you just gonna stare at me like a robot?"
Nina's eyelid twitched at being called that name. Mia swirled a couple inches closer as she continued her teasing.
"Why'd you even come to the Festival if you're not going to dance with me?" She shot the Ultimate Black Diamond a smirk and a challenging wink.
Nina floated six feet backward in raised alert. There was no telling what this red jester would pull once her opponent was in her natural attack range. The only thing an Otome fought harder to protect than her own life was her Master's life. Especially when it was a married Master.
Nina's GEM earring suddenly chimed. It was Nagi. He sounded like he was the only person in the world more annoyed than her.
"Will you split that goose's head open already, Nina? I can still hear her squawking on my end, and I do like the look of that fancy palace."
Nina grunted out of the corner of her lip and instantly Materialised her black sword. She glared with icy intent toward the happy, whimsy, carefree fighter sharing the sky in front of her. It was time to clip this overconfident Otome's feathers.
Author's notes:
This fanfic is for just in case (1) you've read both chapters of Solvents & Shieldmaidens, and (2) you were wondering what Mia's personality was like before she got too much of The Goo on her.
Basically the formula for generating this OC is: Start with Miaka Yuuki as a base template. Dress her up like the Qiao sisters from Dynasty Warriors so she "feels" more like a natural part of that feudal Chinese setting instead of being a modern girl who got imported there. Adjust her age closer to the Xiao Qiao from Red Cliff so she comes off a little more sultry and independent (I am so sorry John Woo). Give her a NEED FOR SPEED and have her Buzz the Tower a couple of times (dun nuh nuh nuh dundun hiiighwaaaay to the). Toss some of Soul Calibur Tira's feathers and some of Harley Quinn's antics on her (because you'd have to be at least a little unhinged to act this jokey in a "serious" HiME / Otome setting). I was also thinking of Ling Xiaoyu, but no direct Xiaoyu attributes went into this design. Oh, and also she's D. Va. For some reason. Thank you. I impersonate Lou Bega on weekends.
Her maiden name is Mia Raki, which is a deliberate reference to Kae Araki, who is the voice actress of the original Miaka. I don't hear Mia as a Kae Araki, though. I hear her more as a Kaho Nakamura.
If Shizuru and Natsuki's bare-skin-to-Robe-material ratio was 1/10, and Akane and Mahya's was a 10/10, Mia's would be somewhere around 6/10. 7/10 max. It's supposed to be lightweight and "pretty" without pushing the envelope way into Makoto Nanaya territory. The "theme" of her Robe is supposed to be like a girly Otome-ized version of how I once saw someone on the Gundam Reddit describe the Sinanju and Tallgeese designs: "Dignified boy with beeg thrusters."
The irony is the Nagi in this universe hates her, but this is totally absolutely 10000% the exact type of battle waifu Obsidian Lord was looking for in the first gen HiME universe. He'd be ALL over that business if Mia showed up in the original series. (update: Read "Red Dusk." Yep, he's all over that.)
If I went around saying I'm the one true king because some bloke who looks like one of the Children of the Damned gave me a magic earring, they'd have me locked away!
(Written four days after I originally posted this story): I've been thinking a little about the design for Mia's off-screen Master. Since she keeps referencing him but you never see him, I started to worry she's going to come off too much like whatsherface the crane maid from Samurai Shodown, where it's like "YOU are her Master! It's a meta self-insert thing! The one she's obsessed with is YOU!" (I hate that gimmick.) So here's some extra lore I came up with: When I first introduced Mia in Solvents & Shieldmaidens, I very, very heavily implied her Master's full name is Kishuku Sou. But he's not some sort of parallel version of Tamahome imported into the Mai Otome universe. Instead, he's a completely different guy who's 20something years old, and he looks like a more confident version of Kazu-kun who got genetically fused with Rufio from Hook during a teleporter experiment. I'm settling on 20something because 1) it's a reasonable enough age that gives him experience as a competent and respected feudal ruler, and 2) it leaves a marriage age gap that would be realistic for a medieval setting without coming off totally gross to a modern audience. So unless you happen to be a dude who looks like Kazu-kun and Rufio got in a Brundlepod accident and survived into his mid-20s, sorry fellas, but you are not her Master.
Additional explainer on character ages:
So. A thing you might be noticing in this Mia fic (and "Twin Turbo," my other Otome Mia fic). I'm smushing the characters' ages into a range closer to what they'd be if Mai Otome was actually a direct sequel to Mai HiME.
Original canon: Ahn Lu (and maybe Fiar?) were the oldest ones. They're year 1. Shizuru and Haruka were one year lower than Ahn Lu and apparently her room attendants. They're year 2. Mai, Natsuki, etc. (i.e. almost all the returning HiME characters, plus Carla and that other Lutesia girl who isn't Carla) were in the class immediately after Shizuru's, as official artwork depicts them all in Coral uniforms while Shizuru and Haruka are in Pearl Trias uniforms. They're year 3. Rosalie and Sara Gallagher were in the class immediately after Mai's (artwork depicts them in Coral uniforms while Mai, Natsuki, and Whatsherface from One of the Lutesias Who Isn't Carla are wearing Trias uniforms). They're year 4. Then there's a several-year break in the timeline, and later Nao, Akane, and Shiho (i.e. the returning HiME leftovers) are in the same Pearl class. At the start of the series, all the main returning HiME characters (now working as Columns and country-specific Otomes) are in their early-to-mid 20s, while the Pearl characters are 16-17.
Adjusted timeline: Ahn Lu and Mia (and probably Fiar) are the oldest and were Pearls in year 1, while Shizuru, Haruka, AND Mai's entire class were Corals. Mia graduated when she was 16. The Pearls from the TV show are now Corals in year 2, starting the semester after Mia graduated. Arika and the gang would be the Corals starting in year 3. In this fanfic's version of the TV show's events, Mia would have been 18, all of the returning Columns/promoted Meisters would have been 18ish and in their jobs for 1-2 years, and the Pearl class would still be 16-17. Mahya and Sara could still be in their mid-20s (maybe they were running the school before Shizuru and Natsuki recently became the principals). Rosalie and the Lutesia girls… ? Umm… put them wherever? Chapter 4 of this fanfic makes some vague allusions to the fact Mia and Carla (who I consider "the more interesting Miyu" because she reuses Miyu's VA and she has an actual personality) may have been school friends, so maybe the Lutesia duo were already Pearls in year 1 in this version.
If you got a problem with the ages getting all jumbled around, you can just pretend any references to Mia being Shizuru's upperclassman aren't there, or assume Mia is also in her mid-20s and just cosplays being 19 (I don't really like the second option, though, because it makes some of her later dynamics with ~existing canon characters~ a little too strange.)
This works out way easier in "Red Dusk" (my Mia fic set in the HiME timeline), where Mia is 15 and everyone just runs off their default TV show ages.
