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The End of the Circus: A Tale of the Yizibajohei
Girls of the Crystal: Record of the Crystal Interlude or Team Honeysuckle
by Regina Magia

C&C by Fred Herriot and Rose Ash

A side story to The End of the Circle: A Tale of the Yizibajohei, by Fred Herriot

Based on characters and situations from Urusei Yatsura, created by Takahashi Rumiko; Sister Princess, created by Tenhiro Naoto and Kimino Sakurako; Mahō Shōjo Madoka Magika, created by Urobuchi Gen, Shaft and Aniplex; and normalman, created by Jim Valentino.

In the Chūō Ward of Kamihama, the third Tuesday of November in 2012, early afternoon...

"This way!" Ayano Rika called out.

A condensed blast of light energy burst forth from the palm of the Lustrous Dazzler, Atase Myu'uo ("Light Queen"), such ripping through numerous strands of yarn littering the barrier floor.

"Oi! Can someone get rid of those minions?!" Miyako Hinano demanded. The recently-Gifted She Who Researches Esoteric Knowledge, Yo'otatohom ("Erudite"), had been busy scanning for non-Gifted humans within the barrier now blocking the members of Memku'o-tone ("Team Honeysuckle"), from rescuing yet another puella magi from the madness of the Incubators. Currently, the ever-scowling would-be researcher was currently in the arms of Kisaki Emiri; since her empathic abilities had no effect on the minions serving whatever eldritch witch her group was now facing, the Living Firestorm, Muhobe ("Devil Child"), gladly volunteered to use her flight abilities to help the team's resident hyper-genius find weaknesses for the others to exploit.

"On it!" Kurumi Manaka declared, she unleashing her "Burning Spices" attack on the winged cogwheel-key creatures moving to swarm around the attacking metahumans. "You got anything?!" the Supreme Chef of the Lower Pits, Leduto ("Inferno"), demanded as her targets were turned to ash by the fusillade of mini-fireballs sent by the amateur chef.

Hinano hummed as she adjusted her scanner-goggles, that being pretty much standard kit for a hyper-genius polymath like her. "Looks like there's only one person here besides us, Manaka-san," she reported. "Most likely a puella magi."

The others of the team — atop Rika, Emiri, Manaka and Hinano, there was the Esoteric Researcher's reborn "darker half" Cyan (now Miyako Tsukiyo); the azure-haired version of her other-self was now the Explosive Mistress of Chemistry, Euosie ("Brimstone") — scanned around the scene before the former eldritch witch called out, pointing, "There!"

The would-be puella magi looked, they instantly focusing on a blonde girl now shooting arrow after arrow at a large pendulum with a grinning upside-down face. Unfortunately, since she ALSO had to dodge the yarn tendrils lining the floor, her shots kept missing the mark. Even more so, more of the witch's clockwork-like minions were swarming towards her from behind.

"What's the plan, Miyako-sempai?!" Emiri demanded, deferring to Hinano's expertise.

"Manaka-san and Rika-san can handle the witch!" the team's hyper-genius answered. "You and I need to get our new friend out of here. Cyan, keep the minions off our backs as we back out of this scene."

"Understood, Onē-sama!" the psychokinetic reborn chemist affirmed with a nod.

Leaping for the sky over the alley, the Supreme Chef raced over to snare the blonde fighter, eliciting a yelp of understandable surprise from the woman the members of Team Honeysuckle were trying to save. "Hey! What do you think you're doing?!" said magical girl sharply demanded as Emiri shifted herself to drop her down on the street close to Tsukiyo.

"No time to explain now!" the transformed eldritch witch snapped as she conjured a glowing sphere.

Said ball of energy was sent flying at the familiars, disintegrating them in a flash of burning energy. Noting how serious Tsukiyo acted — never mind that reflecting on her obvious twin sister and the others of this strange group of what had to be either non-magical metahumans or parahumans — the magical warrior nodded in acceptance as the Living Firestorm moved to get her free of the barrier and back to reality. "Don't worry about Cyan, Ojō-san," Emiri affirmed with a reassuring grin, she squeezing the other girl's hand as they slipped clear of the danger zone. "Soon as we're done here, we'll explain everything."

Two hours later, outside old Nimiro (AKA Habitation Four) on Yiziba (local time: An hour after breakfast)...

Nesu...MADAUTU!

The local version of the Cave of the Future was inundated with blinding light before a dark figure stepped out of the wall of mesonium marking this particular point where the Great Crystal of Power could be physically touched by someone living on the surface of Yiziba. Averting their eyes from such brilliance, the members of Team Honeysuckle waited for the echoes of the Conservator's voice to disappear before they perked on detecting the metered footfalls of someone whose first-self had been one of the most beautiful professional models to strut the runways of Kuole in the years before the Dawn of Power.

"Oh, my...this is SO much better!" the voice of their new friend trilled, making everyone look over…

...before they found their cheeks reddening on seeing that the already-attractive Ami Ria had been transformed into the current incarnation of the Glittering Paragon of Fashion, Madautu ("Muoti"); given that the pretty blue-eyed teen with the long wavy dirty blonde-brown hair did work as an amateur model when not in school or acting as a magical girl, it didn't surprise her new friends that she would gravitate to THIS particular Gift. Before any of them could comment, the latest girl to have been saved from the ravages of the Incubators and the unending thirst for despair that drove their clients among the Sidines moved to pose herself in front of a nearby vanity mirror, nodding in approval. "Even better, my wish didn't get undone," she mused aloud.

The other members of her new team approached her. "We're sorry that we didn't get to you sooner, Ria-san," Manaka apologized as Rika and Emiri pulled out PAAs to snap pictures of Ria in her uniform, a more flexible version of the halter top-and-long skirt model worn by people such as Tariko Katabarbe's sister Sukeyama Sakuya did as Courtesan. "Emiri told us that she sensed something off about you when she saw you at Walnuts the other day; she didn't know what it was because you had a soul gem."

The reborn model-turned-urban warfare fighter — like Tariko's and Sakuya's younger German-born sister Tenhiro Haruka, Ria's metahuman powers were primarily in the empathic range, both receptive and broadcast; this had allowed her first self Sea Ane to keep friends and loved ones safe from rioters when the Unending League of Super-Soldiers rampaged through the capital city of old Loruotuto on the western equatorial continent during the early years of the Dawn of Power — waved her down. "No harm done," Ria said as she walked over to where her normal clothes had been set aside, reaching into her jacket to pull out a pink, four-pointed star-shaped gem containing the fragment of her soul which had been cleaved off when her contract was forged by Kyūbē. "By the way, you didn't happen to nab that witch's Grief Seed, did you?" she then wondered as she gazed on Rika.

The Lustrous Dazzler shook her head. "I got distracted by a message from Ren-chan. I turned away to answer her; by the time I looked back, it was gone. Sorry about that," she then apologized.

"I managed to get a glimpse of the person who took it," Manaka then cut in. "She had bright green hair sticking out from some kind of cap." Here, the Supreme Chef hummed. "Sort of like the type of peaked cap a ship captain wears, I think."

Considering that, Hinano tapped her chin. "I might have seen someone like that around Kamihama," the Esoteric Researcher noted. "Let's head back home and see if any of the resident puella magi know anything about her."

"With luck, we'll find more recruits along the way," her darker half-turned-effective twin sister affirmed with a nod as Ria used her new PAA to make her civilian clothes vanish into stuff-space so she could change out of her battlesuit once they were back on Earth. "Ria-san, would you like to join us? If something comes up, you can use the opportunity to burn off post-Gifting shock."

The reborn model from Yiziba's analogue of France hummed before grinning in anticipation. "Don't mind if I do."

The End...For Now

WRITER'S NOTES

This short is set the day after the events shown in Part Nine, which puts it around Part 24 of the main story.

The characters appearing here hail from the Persona Record series of fanfic-like stories based on the original Mahō Shōjo Madoka Magika and its rôle playing video game spin-off, Magia Record: Mahō Shōjo Madoka Magika Gaiden.

The given name of Cyan used here, Miyako Tsukiyo, is built from the kanji 水青. This reading uses the nanori way of verbalizing a way of saying "cyan"; the actual meaning of the term here is "water blue". Nanori is a variation of the kun'yomi (local Japanese way of reading kanji) reading specifically meant for use for the names of people and places.

Kuole is the Yizibajohei analogue of Paris in France; this was first mentioned in the omake Rise of the Darling of the West (which is published in Part 15 as filed on the website here).