"Muh." You are still pouting an hour later, when you are finally allowed to leave the bath and get dressed again. You understand that Elena seems to enjoy reversing certain roles when it comes to these things, but you absolutely do not appreciate it.
Also, she bully you. Muh. Muh muh.
As a result, you are currently down inside your basement again, seeking out Brian to lodge an official complaint. There is no reason you want to point this complaint in his direction in particular, you just felt like complaining and that means Brian is getting squeezed.
The wonders of keeping things simple and to the point. Really, everyone should do that- society at large may be less reasonable, but at least it would be more honest this way, you think.
Still, while you can easily navigate the area down beneath your home (Brian obviously went for a floor layout that optimizes the efficiency of space usage and all, but that also makes the entire thing dreadfully predictable and easy to see through, which are bad qualities for dungeons filled with monsters and treasure, as any JRPG can confirm), actually finding the little rascal is a lot more… involved than taking a stroll down the stairs.
First you have to identify what sounds are coming from where, then figure out which come from sources other than Brian himself, with a few upsets due to the unexpected events that take place on the way; what you think is him sawing something is actually a few of your J.A.C.K. clones chewing at a bunch of circuitry out of boredom, for example, which leads you to wishing them good fun as you pass by.
However, eventually you do find the evildoer you were after, after you loop back around to the floors closer to your home and actually engage your Brian sensor, the useful additional sense that allows you to track down and sniff out the Puchuu in question at any time, when you bother. And yes, you specifically think this in order to let him know there is no escape from you.
You value a positive work environment, here at JackieCorp, and what environment could ever possibly be more positive than one consisting of endless Jackie?
That's right, Brian, chew on this one! Muuhuhuhuh!
You eventually find him in the temporary storeroom you usually use to dump any loot you acquired, but don't really have any use for for the moment, such as, for example, monster bodies. In fact, that's its primary purpose so far, despite what feeble attempts were made to convert it into something else, something potentially less useful.
Because you use it so it is at maximum usefulness as is. Simple, straightforward logic, far more of it than the average person manages to make all day in their pathetic, mundane little life!
Inside, Brian is in the process of taking apart the machinery you stole from a certain scientist obsessed with blue balls, perking up as you open the door from amidst a small hill of various components in all colors and shapes, some of which make your eyes water a little as you take a look at them. "Chuh, Jackie! Good work taking this stuff, I can take credit for a credible threat to the whole city over it!"
"… Muh." Why the hell is Brian happy to see you? That's not like him. Not at all.
Uncaring of your thoughts, the black plush menace swishes its tail around as it gathers up a few important-looking bits and bops. "It also gives us access to a few intricate bit of technology I do not have to build, puchuh. I may hate your guts, but you at least do your job. I can respect that, if nothing else, chuh."
What is this thing, and what did it do to the real Brian?
"Chuuh, I have simply decided to take a step back and refocus my time and attention to refine my work-life-balance, puchuh. Pay attention to what really matters in life, chuh. I found myself being so invested in petty squabbles I lost sight of what matters to me, puuh."
… Yeah, nah. "Muh. I don't buy it. Petty shit matters to you."
Dropping the facade, Brian stills, his abominable little plush face staring deep into yours. "Exactly. Chuh. And the more I try to wrangle you chuhy chuh, the harder it gets, even though you're my best shot at actually making them all chuhoke on their bullchuh when I retake my rightful place and have all of them put into sensory overload stasis as punichuhment for what they did to me."
He comes closer, an ungainly gait seeing him more limping than walking as he keeps up eye contact.
"So. I took a day to think. Chuh. And what I think is that our working relationship was unnecessarily strained on account of both of our… issues. Puchuh. So I am telling you now that we will stop getting in each other's way and just do what we each do best. Puchuuh. And if that means I have to tolerate your lip, then so be it. Deal?"
Brian's speech grows hacked-off, almost a little slurred as he forcefully suppresses the speech impediments forced upon him by his management, but his voice not once changes pitch, tone entirely even and almost dead or robotic. You, on the other hand, have only the one question about this. "Still catching up on the paperwork?"
"Chuuh, I will be done in around two months at the rate I am going and I do not want you to heap more on me," he admits. "Doesn't matter, puchuh. I just don't want to have to actually try disposing of you, because at this point I doubt I even could."
Aww, that's the nicest thing Brian has ever said to you! Actually, it's the nicest thing you've ever heard him say about anyone. Brian, as a person, is generally not someone you can count on to praise anyone other than himself- which probably plays into this, given he (mistakenly) thinks of you as one of his creations and, therefore, better than the vast majority of beings in existence by default anyways.
Still, you wouldn't have expected him to actually admit it.
"Muh," you begin, only to think better of it and actually clear your throat, rolling your eyes and crossing your arms at the effort you have to put into this to make the point properly and not half-mutter everything you say. "Fine. I'll stop. And keep doing the dirty work, someone needs to do it. Just make sure to repay me."
The 'or else' remains tactfully unspoken. See? You can do tact, even if you do your damndest to piss all over the very concept usually.
"Chuuh, fine, as long as you actually put your back into it."
"Muuh, fine! I do all the real work around here anyways!" Yes, it doesn't take you long to get right down to the real issues, but that's longer than it usually takes anyways.
"Chuh, fine!"
"Muh, fine!"
Both of you stand opposite one another, glaring half-heartedly as you try to figure out some way to go from this conversational dead-end. Annoyingly, Brian beats you to it- just this once.
"Speaking of payment, puchuh, what should we do with this Prehensile Emotional Neutralization Invertion Specialization device?"
"… What is this, you're literally just making shit up to get the acronyms together now?" You mutter again, still not particularly invested in speaking super much but, well, may as well.
"Chuh, blame the guy that built it, the name's engraved on the inside of one of the plates," Brian shrugs his shoulders, or expresses the same sentiment as that using his quadrupedal body language, anyways. "It can channel emotional energy into something useful, but only in limited amounts at any given time, chuuh. If you'd like, I'd pay you a couple silver to take it off your hands and install it down here for my own use, though… Do you still do that streaming thing?"
"Muh, what streaming?"
… Oh boy. You see, daddy, when a virtual idol and the internet love each other very much, they make streams, which are like videos except…
You end up spending most of the rest of your day on helping Brian install the device you now know under the name of P.E.N.I.S. in what amounts to your interdimensional internet router, the two of you bonding awkwardly over the DIY home renovation thing for once. You can't be sure, but you think Brian may actually be trying to be nice to you, something you believe neither you nor him have experience with.
You with him not being a little ball of spit, vinegar and… more vinegar, him with not being an absolute shit to people. It's a work in progress, you guess.
But hey, neither of you is passive-aggressive at the other, nor do you mutually ignore each other, so it's honestly a very different experience from how you've been experiencing working with Brian so far. Bit weird, but not in a bad way or anything.
Just… different.
At any rate, though, the new addition to your place's internet connection system should be functional just like this, assuming you can drum up some emotional responses over the internet in the way Elena insists you totally could. You are a bit more doubtful about that, but hey, your PlayStriker 4, scavenged from the Overcity all those many moon ago, may as well serve to test it.
Though you totally think shitposting some troll content on some random site would work better, privately. Heck, just create some throwaway accounts on Readit and post something about how you think 'the gays' should tone it down a bit and watch the meltdown happen, not like any actually gay people actually worth caring about hanging around in that kind of toxic environment.
And neither do you give a fuck about people's sexual orientations. Heck, you thought Elena was gay way before she decided she was, though the motivation she cited- liking whatever gender you liked because you were her role model- was kind of suspect, not gonna lie.
Mostly because that's not how sexual orientation works. Kids, man; even if you try to be relaxed and just let them take things at their own pace, they still always will worry you as a parent. Good thing you decided to screw it and just be completely irresponsible this time around.
Oh yeah, and you also notify Brian about Dazzling Destruction and her desire to meet him. By name. Brian, for his part, doesn't actually introduce himself as 'Brian' anywhere at all, considering he has no friends nor connections to the world at large other than yourself, which worries and annoys him equally.
Actually, no, it mostly annoys him, you think. The part where his true identity as 'Brian' is becoming known to people, you mean.
Anyways, he lets you know he'll see about keeping his schedule flexible for the eventuality of you setting up a meeting before you part ways for the time being, leaving you alone with the voice in your head. Elena, for her part, seems unduly excited to 'introduce' you to whatever obviously bored and uninterested people apparently were watching you when you were gaming so far.
Honestly, it's not like you paid them any mind, literally as you weren't aware of their existence at all, so how many people would realistically tune in to that?
"Muh. Chat." You can see the chat on your screen now, actually letting you see and interact with the people on the other side of your internet connection, now that Elena told you what you had to do to make this happen. However, way too many messages immediately start scrolling at blinding speed all over the side of your screen. "Shut up, chat. You're too noisy."
… For some reason they speed up, more and more messages scrolling through. What is going on with these people?
New Base Upgrade:
Prehensile Emotional Neutralization Invertion Specialization Device: A specialized piece of machinery that may be connected to sources of emotional energy of various kinds to refine and concentrate it into usable form. Having been added to the internet router, it draws a small amount of power from Jackie's viewers when she streams herself playing video games, generating Magical Essence or refueling special devices meant to hold emotional energy.
Dear diary,
It's me! Your favorite author Yoshikawa Mitsuko-chan, or Mitsuko Yoshikawa-chan by Western naming conventions. Also your only author, seeing as you don't exactly have much choice in who gets to write in you, hahaha!
Before you ask, today was a fine, cancer-free day as well! I went to school, which is really quite novel and enjoyable even though I'm supposed to be bored by it after a single day already (according to Olivia-san), had some ice cream I bought and ate by myself without needing a nurse's assistance and even made a new friend! And not just any friend, but a bestest friend forever, sharing the rank only with Kyubey-chan!
(Also, I always knew it, but there are way more flavors of ice cream than they had in the hospital. It's not that I don't get it, they were not an ice cream saloon, but still, I am on to the ice cream conspiracy and will keep you updated as the case progresses. This time I had grapefruit and passion fruit, by the way.)
(Also also, I'm getting better at adjusting my mannerisms! It feels weird to just call everyone by their names, but then I never went to school back in Japan, so I can't really compare these things well. I am still making my own bentos to eat on the rooftop during lunch break, though! This is non-negotiable.)
'But Mitsuko-chan', I hear you asking, 'please tell me more about your new bestest friend forever that proves that many other people are more important than me!' Oh well, maybe I should indulge you, sure. Her name is Jackie and she is a Magical Girl just like me! In costume, she is Ice Empress, which is really cool and amazing and sound way better than Dazzling Destruction, though jealousy is unseemly and so I shall bottle this feeling up forever so I can die full of bitterness and regret in the end, the true Japanese way!
She is also my comrade. She actually caught me while I was meting out just punishment to a bunch of monsters, so I was super worried she might be, mhm, worried or repulsed or something like that, but she didn't mind at all! She even complimented me on my good work. I shouldn't have wavered over how a fellow Magical Girl would see me, in retrospect, haha!
Hahahaha. Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahah.
She even promised she'd help me with my secret mission to carry the secret missive Kyubey entrusted to me to the Puchuu known as Brian! Not everyone would have done that. Clearly, she shares my good humor and pure heart. There is no better first comrade anyone could wish for!
Oh, I don't even care whether we meet again to bring just punishment unto evildoers and monsters alike or to eat that delicious cake I told you about before together, every day is promising so much fun and joy!
I sometimes think about whether I am actually dying, you know. If this is all just some crazed hallucination as my brain folds its clothes and turns off the light for the last time, and I'm really still lying in that hospital bed, just silently and quietly going out. That is a little terrifying, see? But I figure, whether I am thinking clearly or not, I should make the best of every day I get, whether it's 'real' or not.
It's real to me! It matters to me! And I am having fun here. And nobody gets to say anything about that, right, mister diary?
Right?
RighT?
RIgHt?!
RIGHT?!
RIGHT?!
RIGHT?!
-Muh
-Muh
-Muh!
-MUH
-Mumumumumuh!
"Chat, you're still noisy. I have to concentrate. No muh."
-The goddess hath spoken
-Hear ye, hear ye
-peons, be bowed and still in her presence
-OMG
-pro gameplay right there
-that spider is such a pain to fight
-* just keeps teleporting away
-Rom is a shitty boss
-Lucky you
-Game still isn't isn't out where I live
-Okay, so it HAS to be weak to lightning
-No way Tonitrus has that damage otherwise
-Goddess of Thunder and Lightning! All bow to the Great ad Mighty Jackie!
"Ice, not lightning, stupid. They just failed to put ice in this game."
-Ur voice is amazing, btw
-Have you considered singing and putting the vids up?
"… No."
-Blush!
-Blush!
-Blush!
-Cute!
-That is some amazing tech there. Anyone know how the avatar was made?
-Who cares, cute
"… Just watch the cutscene. Boss is dead already."
"Fuaah!" Yawning, you stretch your arms out above your head, the deep breath of arguably fresh air helping you regain full consciousness once again. Next, you softly let yourself plomp down on your small mountain of bedding again, sleepily nuzzling Tabitha's neck as your kitty mirrors your own awakening, her little pawsies stretching out as she sniffs your hair.
You aren't sure if it may be because of your special ability to regenerate, but you've noticed for… a while now, that you don't actually need a full night's sleep most days while still maintaining normal activity. It still kind of feels better to get your proper ten hours of sleep a day, but you can make do with as little as five if you must.
Actually, thought. Could it be having a literal kid's metabolism is one of the leading limiting factors in most magical girls' capacity to spend time productively? Like, as you understand it, most still go to school, for some insane reason that is far beyond you, so having to sleep a bunch and make sure they don't get upset stomachs all on top of that seems like it would dramatically decrease the amount of time they have to practice and actually hunt monsters down.
Actually, going by the genre's conventions, most would be suddenly alerted and have to intervene when a monster actually attacks, whether it's in the middle of school or the middle of the night.
Even worse! It's a wonder anyone actually does this job at all when they have to work under those insane conditions. You'd have literally told Brian to go die in a ditch the first time he interrupted Elena's sleep if she was a magical girl and you were still Jack instead of Jackie.
It was hard enough to get your baby girl to sleep properly in the first place. Like, you let her stay up however long she wanted, but breakfast time was at seven thirty sharp and you made her get up no matter what.
Let her contend with the consequences of her own actions and all that. The thing parents are meant to keep contained to controllable and low-impact environments until kids learn their lessons and all that.
Okay, one, I wasn't that bad, two, when I stayed up late it was totally worth it, three, I love you too, daddy.
Kids. They never change.
But back to Jackie matters, you have breakfast to attend to! And afterwards, a trip to the beach. Did you remember to text the B-Team to meet you later, actually?
… You probably didn't, but whatever. They're magical girls, they better be used to being called out on random emergencies. They don't have your elevated state of being just plain better and being allowed to pick your engagements at your own pace instead of your enemy's, after all.
You wait and wait and wait, your legs bobbing a little behind yourself as you await the trio of magical girls you told to come meet you at this location. You even went and took some extra time to prepare all the equipment you will need for this expedition to the beach.
And then you rode Pinky the Mightyful, even, to give them extra time to scramble. After you used the magic you put on it to make it look yellow to the casual observer, beyond being completely uninteresting and not worth stealing.
… Sure, you technically had everything ready as it was, so you didn't really give them much time, but still. Idly sucking on your popsicle, the frozen, flavored water fitting perfectly to the bright, sunny day you are having.
Seriously, the sun's shining bright, only a few pure white, puffy clouds are moving along the sky and you're sitting on a bench right next to a downright idyllic street lantern with a seagull sitting on it. Ruddy little thing is probably looking to eat your stuff if you let down your guard.
Finally, though, you feel the magical emanations of three distinct magical girls drawing near. Turning around, your knees on the bench now, you wave for them once they arrive, all dressed in their magical girl costumes. "Heeey, over here!"
"… Did Jackie just… call out to us?" Olivia asks.
"I know, right. Did she hit her head?" Kerrie replies. Both of them shall be punished properly in due time.
Bubbles, on the other hand, just grins as she sees you. "Hey Jackie, got any more of those popsicles? I always loved those!"
You hold a second one out, kept cool by your freezing touch. "You're welcome. The others don't get any, though, they're being stupid."
"You haven't said 'muh' a single time even though you've spoken severel sentences!" Olivia accuses you, pointing and all.
"Duh, welcome aboard Captain Obvilia. Do I look like an idiot that can't speak in proper sentences without drawing on wordless exclamation all the time? Hm?"
"Nope, not at all," Bubbles immediately plays along, patting your head. Which you shall allow, even though you have no idea where her hands may have been before this. "They're just being stupid."
You nod, decisively. Stage one of your plan Obligatory Beach Episode is complete.
There are some minor protests, mainly on account of the peanut gallery that are Olivia and Kerrie, but now that you finally have everyone here, you can get started on beach activities, as is only proper when you're on the beach.
What's that, you're here to investigate reports of some giant octopus thing? C'mon, let's be real, if there was any real danger Nessie, that shark monstergirl lifeguard, would have murdered and eaten it weeks ago. No, you fully expect that you are here for something else, and that means you have to approach your beach day differently.
Hence here you are, making it the obligatory beach episode. This way, the worst case is that there may be some tentacle groping of the other girls, each with their own humorous reactions, before you freeze whatever owns said tentacles into an ice block and send it out to sea again.
It's a win-win. Well, mostly a win for Bubbles, not the other two, but sometimes you just have to make lemonade when life insists on handing you lemons. And by 'life' you mean 'Jackie'.
Don't like it? Well, what're they gonna do about it, huh? That's what you thought.
Still, there are some minor hiccups, but thanks to your force of personality you can move straight past those. Specifically, the swimsuits you conjured out of thin air need to be worn, yet a certain Olivia had to be convinced to do so first.
Bubbles usually wears clothing that covers less than most bikinis anyways and Kerrie wasn't too bothered by her swimsuit either, but for some reason the green one had to be an issue as always. That said, once you finally get her to change into it, it looks jut fine and normal.
"A-are you sure this is okay to wear in public?"
"Don't, like, worry girl, you look fine!" Bubbles reassures her, waving around her popsicle.
Olivia, though, just blushes and tries to protect her chest harder than before without looking like she's doing so. "Th-that's not reassuring coming from you…"
"Stop making a big deal, it's fine," you tell her, informing rather than convincing. That is how your opinion works, after all, being fact rather than a subjective thing is the whole point of it being yours. "Now come. We gonna swim."
"… Still weird to hear your voice like this," Kerrie remarks in her one piece swimsuit, glancing at you as you lead the gang across the beach. "But hey, now that the clothes are out of the way, mind telling us why we're here, Jackie?"
"There's rumors about some giant squid or octopus on the beach, which is why we're here to investigate," you explain, holding your popsicle up like a noble blade of old. It is your third one, by the way, and the only reason it isn't melting by now is that you're keeping it cold. "So we need to blend in."
"There aren't that many people on the beach on a weekday morning, though, are there?" Olivia asks, face still red as she plods along through the sand like the puppy she is. "I don't think I could stand a crowd seeing me like this…"
"I told you, it's fine! Jeez, why do I have to tell you everything thrice before you understand…" You grumble a bit, shifting to mumbling once you take a few more licks from your icy stick of flavored water. "Now let's go choose a nice spot first. I brought an umbrella and some towels, so we just need someplace with lots of space that's close to the water."
"… We're totally just having a beach day, aren't we?" Kerrie sighs, hand on her face. "And we're skipping school for it, too."
"School, schmool! This is, like, way more awesome than that!" Bubbles wiggles a little, letting her breasts and butt move around in the outfit best summarized as strings of cloth just barely covering her privates. "Think I can fish a couple cute beach boys show me their 'surf moves', eh?"
"Surfing is shit around here," you tell her, having been the owner of a glorious male beach bod once upon a time and, consequently, having done some research on the new place before you moved. The car fire just complicated things from there. "But the life guard has two dicks and tits larger than your head."
Kerrie shudders. "Do I want to know?"
The green puppy jumps between you, waving her hands urgently. "No! No you don't! Let's go be delinquents and find a place to hang out already!"
Finally, she's getting into the spirit of things.
Naturally, the beach is, technically, the territory of a large predator, one that you wish to ensure will not surprise you in the middle of your relaxation nor your hunt for whatever monster is hanging around. Because if magical girl shows teach you one thing, it is that these kinds of things, unless taken care of beforehand, always manage to interfere with each other.
Truly a most entertaining, yet educative form of media.
Quite. However, looking at the trio of girls you brought with you as insurance… Bubbles is already wandering off, Olivia is digging a hole for some reason and Kerrie is looking between them, unsure whom to keep an eye on.
And she's actually right for once- leaving either of them alone is all but guaranteed to result in collateral casualties, whether because Bubbles gets her hands on a few poor victims that would get dehydrated in the sun rather quickly or because the green girl got herself trapped inside her own sand pit, somehow.
So you may need to counteract those potential issues, you suppose. Sighing, you wave a hand, bringing Elena to life, or at least corporeality, once again.
Hey, I'm plenty alive! In the first place, this is my body we're using here, okay?
"Take care of the kids while I'm out, please?"
Her chosen form's refined features twitching, your daughter shrugs. "Very well, I suppose someone has to. Just make sure not to get into trouble while I'm gone."
With that, she casually transforms the kimono she's usually wearing away, making use of the way her clothes are part of her body to give herself a bikini made of ice instead of what she usually wears.
"Alright children, gather up! And make sure not to bother anyone else on the beach. Yes, I mean you, Bubbles."
With the situation here well in hand, you move off to quietly scout out the area you remember Nessie's home to be built it, in that secluded spot not too far from the rest of the beach. Surely, you shall be able to see through her in moments, for she is a simple and predictable creature!
As you have been here once before, it is trivially easy to find your way around, and you do not at all get confused nor do you end up having to retrace your footsteps in the sand to figure out where you even are anymore.
Finally, though, you are right where you wanted to be, which is the approach to Nessie's place. Your mission here is to ascertain what she is doing, what she knows and whether or not she will get in your way during your stay at the beach.
You know, basic questions about rapacious shark monstergirls you should clear up in advance and all that. It's just common sense to do this any time one visits the beach, lest they find themselves ambushed by a horny three meter shark with tits and a two hemipenes.
It is a known risk.
Of course, having some experience with the matter at hand, you are somewhat of an expert on this typical beach hazard. No sharks shall perform surprise butt sex, nor any other kind of surprise sex, on your person!
For you are the one to initiate such encounters, rather than having them initiated upon yourself! The natural order of things must be preserved, after all, and what could be more natural than you forcing yourself on others?
Keeping alert and aware of your surroundings as you infiltrate the area around Nessie's home, slowly creeping along to allow you the element of surprise-
You hear it before you see it, rounding one of the rocky outcroppings concealing this place. Giggling, laughing, playful growling, it is the sound of an enormous predator toying with its next victim.
Poking your head around the corner, salt-worn, craggy stone hardly enough to stop you, you spy none other than Nessie herself, the huge, blue-skinned monster woman standing at twice the height of the average man (so approximately half a Jackie, going by modernized measurements as prescribed by the Frost Empire), her many old scars and razor-sharp teeth making her true nature obvious.
And, right in front of her, a busty blonde, no older than twenty, is oohing over Nessie's muscles, clad in nothing but a red bikini the shark woman is already fiddling with as she grins at her.
Clearly, this is an opportunity. You just have to decide what for.
You smile, a little smirk forming on your face as you slowly move forward, plotting out a course of action. Obviously, you won't get in the way of whatever fun these two are going to have- you aren't about to cockblock Nessie, that would be a literal dick move- but, on the contrary, you absolutely do plan to get involved here yourself.
The moment when Nessie's guard is down, you shall strike! All you need to do is to dart in at the right moment, to ensure you have the time to position yourself and conjure some ice to stand on, make it much less awkward to get your dick into her.
Curse these unnecessarily large size differences! Alas, without some support, you barely make it above the shark woman's knees, such is her stupidly great height. Obviously, reality yet again fails to account or the fact you are, naturally, tall enough in spirit and it should just adjust physics to make this work, so you need to do the adjusting by hand.
Slowly creeping onward, your path curves around the pair of Nessie and her current victim, getting you behind them as they fool around, the great shark looking out towards the ocean- or rather, her back is turned toward the land, her eyes are likely occupied by the pair of bouncy tits now freed of their bikini top.
Large enough to outsize your head, they are tipped with surprisingly cute pink nubs you see Nessie playing with already, the lifeguard-imitating monster bending down to lick and nibble one of them to the vocal approval of the blonde that owns them, blue hands groping her bikini-clad butt at the same time. Quite obviously, Nessie got some moves on her, though naturally much less so than you had when you still were Jack.
You stopped flirting and sleeping around as much when you started to raise Elena, but you were somewhat of a playboy before that, if you do say so yourself. Not that you had a new one night stand going every day or anything, but more often than not when you went out to get laid, you did.
Anyways, you stealthily move closer, watching as Nessie takes off her own clothes, too, letting the blonde pet her muscular thighs and stare at her genital configuration. "Two…?" She asks breathlessly, mouth open a little as she realizes the arm-sized cock pointing at her comes in a double pack.
"You'll love 'em," Nessie growls, undoing the knots on the sides of the beach babe's bottoms to let them flutter to the ground, taking a deep breath once her entire body is exposed. She's shaved, too, which you appreciate.
Pubic hair just gets in the way. It's a nuisance.
"I'm not sure they'll fit- Eek!" Giggling playfully and only a bit nervously, the blonde is lifted off her feet by hands too large to do anything less than grope her while moving her, laid down in the shade of of a rock formation and onto a suspiciously smooth, curved piece of it. "Jeez, you're twice the size of my boyfriend, each dick, but you're just as eager!"
"Can't help it when you're so sexy," Nessie continues to growl, kneeling over the blonde, her cocks hovering over her like the Sword of Damocles or something. "So how do you want this, just one at first, or the real deal?"
"Aww, you're even asking first? I might just decide girls are nicer to fuck than boys," she replies, chuckling and reaching up to feel up Nessie's breasts, the huge shark tits in question appropriately sized for the frame they belong to and as such absolutely huge compared to anything you'd see on a human woman. Licking her lips, she grins. "But I'm totally at your mercy, you know? You could do whatever you want with me, and there's nothing I could do about it…"
Nessie growls louder now, groping her all over. To be honest, you're kinda turned on yourself. "Turn around. I'll make you scream."
"Promises, promises~!" The blonde teases, but does as demanded, getting on all fours and waving her butt at the double-dicked shark.
Who doesn't need any more invitation than that. Grabbing the blonde's tanned hips, she adjusts her dicks a little, hurriedly getting their heads aligned with the woman's cunt and asshole both, spreading her butt to watch as she slowly presses them both inside her, steadily spreading her open.
The beach chick is moaning and twitching, being filled up as she is. Meanwhile, though, Nessie is bent over her, on all fours herself…
You drop your own swimsuit on the sand, soundlessly approaching. Just a little bit more…
Steadily and urgently thrusting just half an inch at a time, the shark woman is quickly working her way into the beach slut she fished herself up, lusty moans and groans filling the air around them. Her shark tail is idly waving around, but you sidestep it carefully, arriving right behind her just as she (finally) manages to stuff herself into her fucktoy entirely.
"So big! Ungh! That's my womb!! You're fucking me so deep, my ass too! Angh!"
"That's right bitch, take it all! I'll-" You step onto a small platform of ice, just enough to let you comfortably reach what you need to, and grab Nessie's hips, slamming your entire cock into her in one thrust. "Rrrrgh!?‽"
"Ah! You just got even bigger! Mmh! So good!"
You bend over Nessie's back, getting closer to her head just a little as she look back in surprise. Her pussy is tight, tighter than you would've expected with your size difference, and her internal muscles are already clamping onto your fuckstick, natural lubricant coating it copiously enough to drip onto the sand below you. "Payback for last time."
With that, you pull almost your entire length out of her again, having to fight against her as she tries to suck it in, only to ram yourself home again straight away, the horny shark woman's legs flexing rhythmically as you do. Without wasting another moment, you rut into her hard and fast, hips rocking against her butt while her tail wiggles next to you, giving you space so you can properly breed its owner.
"Rgh, ragh, don't stop!" She demands, redoubling her own efforts to breed the beach bimbo pinned underneath her. "Harder!"
You oblige, not about to not do just that. For a while, maybe a minute or two, your world is reduced to fucking the womb of the shark girl double penetrating that other chick, asserting your superiority and getting your dick wet at the same time in a classical win-win situation. Again and again you fill her up, your balls tingling as you produce enough seed to feed a small family, all about to be sent to siege the womb of this predator of the seas-
"Fuck!" Nessie growls, speeding up and pulling you along to do so as well. "Fuck fuck fuck fuck! Fuck! I'm gonna-!"
Pulling the twitching woman close to her chest, she comes, a quick look confirming she's bulging out her belly with the size of both her cocks and her spunk at once. At the same time, her cunt squeezes down on you unreasonably tightly, muscles almost vibrating as they suck you in-
"Uunh…" Your face tenses up as you make a weirdly cute sound, as you now feel comfortable admitting, your knot wet and warm with her fluids, then inside of her as well, the sensation more than enough to end you over the edge as well. Hugging her back tightly, you deposit a fat load of your seed inside of Nessie, spurt after spurt of thick cum pumped straight at her womb and unable to leave.
By the tenth surge or so, you have achieved your official goal, giving Nessie a bump of her own, despite her tightly muscled sixpack. It fills you with pride and petty satisfaction, the exact thing you need before you are happy at any time of the day.
Now relaxed and breathing slowly (and the blonde chick slowly starting to stir underneath her), the shark over her shoulder and at you again. "How long're you gonna stay stuck to me, twerp?"
"Knotted. Can't pull out," you lie through your teeth. "Not that I would even if I could. You're comfy."
Her back may be scarred and her skin kind of rough, but she's surprisingly warm and her muscles just tough enough to still be comfortable to lie on. If you had the time, you'd go or a nap just like this.
"Hurry up so we can do round two," Nessie complains, making you sit up. A little. "And next time I see you, I'll ruin your pretty little holes. Just letting you know."
"Hah. Not if I ruin yours first." Endless sexual stamina, don't fail now!
It takes a while, but eventually you leave a drowsy and satisfied Nessie behind, her exhausted beach-bodied fucktoy still slowly suckling on her cocks as she hangs onto her lap. You suppose that, as long as the Veil doesn't completely cloud her mind over the next couple days, the shark-y lifeguard just got herself a new returning squeeze, which, hey, good on her.
You, in the meantime, are off to play some more, seeing as you're having a day on the beach. First you go to make fun of Olivia, for whatever stupid thing she's doing this time, but…
Well, you quickly figure out what she dug up all that sand for. It's kind of visible.
Carefully sliding her fingers over the structure formed of wet, by now mostly dried sand, the greenette smooths out a few of the miniature towers along the lowest ring of the sand fortress, rather than sandcastle, she built while you were absent, with her finger. Looking closely, you can 'see' how she invokes a small bit of magic, a screen of manipulated air formed to delicately mold the sand.
"Oh, Jackie! Look, I made a thing. What do you think?"
Rather than what you're thinking, you're just kind of astonished this girl managed to do… this, while you were gone. That's an awful lot of attention to detail paid to building it, you know?
"It looks very nice. Did you have fun making it, Olivia?"
"M-hm!" She smiles and nods, stretching her arms. "I was gonna make an orc army that besieges it, but Kerrie said that would be too fragile to put all over the ground around it. And I guess she's right, even if I really wanted to."
Amazing. You suppose you understand, now, why Yasmin could do the things she did with sand, in hindsight, when Olivia can carve such a structure out using nothing but patience, care and a little magic to help along.
Magic tends to take these kinds of little things and exaggerate them explosively, after all. Sandcastles are a thing, so a magical girl specialized into sand can make magical castles out of it? Sure, why not, not like magic has to care about anything beyond the symbolic nature of what it's doing.
… You will get your magical ice mecha and ice castle one day. Those were way too cool not to rip off.
"Want me to help make the army, then?" You ask, raising a hand. "I can just make them out of ice. That way they'll be a contrast to the fortress, too."
"Would you?" Olivia turns around to face you, finally, a little shimmer of happiness in her eyes. "That would be amazing! Oh, be right back, I'll get more sand and make catapults and archers out of it to match!"
Oh no, now she's a happy puppy. Now that you've accidentally made her happy, you'll have to make sure to destroy her hopes and dreams a little more to make up for it again later. Perfectly balanced socialization of your pet, as all things should be.
Ah well, you suppose it can't hurt to play with her for a bit. After all, you can make a giant monster army that will absolutely crush her fortress now! Muahahaha!
"Jackie," Elena says, her golem body appearing behind you, "could you play keeper for this girl? She's in horny jail."
"Nooo! Don't bonk me!" Bubbles cries, wiggling while held under her arm like a sack of potatoes. "I was, like, totally just about to get laaaiiid!"
"You were bothering that nice man because he was black. 'Craving BBC' is not an excuse, especially when he comes to the beach with his family," your daughter lectures her. "Now behave while I go bail Kerrie out from that trouble she got into with the beach restaurant. Because you managed to break their windows while trying to peep on the men's restroom."
Somehow, Elena sounds less impressed with Bubbles with every sentence. Sensing as much, the blonde sags down in defeat, hanging there listlessly.
You just pat the ground next to yourself. "If you behave, you can help me design monsters to besiege this sand city."
"Can they have big cocks?"
"What can't have big cocks?"
"Then okay. I promise I'll behave." Whispering, Bubbles continues. "For a few minutes."
… You may need to just freeze her in place and stuff three ice dildos into her.
Honestly, you're kind of weirded out by the point you've spent enough time on this to form a historically 'accurate' brigade of siege catapults (as defined by Olivia, who for some reason has the weirdest hobbies) and an army consisting of a couple thousand miniature monster figurines made of ice; while playing around like this is surprisingly fun, you were kind of expecting to have something else happen by now.
Like, c'mon, you're a group of magical girls all frolicking on the beach, where a monster is supposed to appear. Going by narrative convention, someone should have screamed about tentacles or been dragged underwater by this point, but even though you've been expectantly checking up on the group every now and then, nobody so much as lost their swimsuits.
Disappointing. Also, worrying. One way or another, you think you may have misjudged the nature of this particular rumor; could it have been a fakeout? Is the narrative messing with you, somehow related to the missing third threat you suspect to have been the J.A.C.K.s in retrospect as a way to hit closer to home? Or maybe… Maybe this particular rumor Melanie 'overheard' wasn't a threat at all?
You could have been mistaken in your initial assumptions, you'll admit it outright. Though, borrowing from how people used to treat monarchs and similar rulers, you would have been misled by reality feeding you bad information, as you cannot make mistakes as a matter of fact. Just how kings weren't wrong even if you thought they were, they were just 'misled by their ministers and advisors'.
Still, you steadfastly insist to yourself that there has to be something here, given the way the usual rumor mill fishing led you to the beach. You refuse to believe your only reliable source of information has been made unusable to you (aside from, possibly Brian, who may actually come in handy again in that case except you don't want to lose the reliability of Melanie's faux-random reports).
Somewhere out there, you think to yourself as you gaze out onto the sea, there has to be-
You tilt your head, eyes narrowing. Is it just you, or did you just catch a glimpse of a face under the water out there? It's gone now, but…
Getting up from where you were sitting in the sand and dusting off your legs, you wave at Olivia, who is currently trying to figure out the logistics of using her magic to make small clouds of sand float above your combined creations. It's a bit much and not all that necessary, you feel, but it's good practice for fine control of magic, so you didn't stop her or anything, either; she may as well, as far as you're concerned.
"I'm gonna go for a swim, be back in a few."
"Uhm, is it okay if I just leave Bubbles buried like this?"
You look at the place where Olivia first started digging for the right layer of sand she wanted to use for her sand building project, currently filled backup again with a writhing Bubbles you threw inside and sealed up, everything under her shoulders buried in sand. Meanwhile, the girl herself is trying to reach the ice dildo you left near her to give her a goal to aspire towards, even as she still can't get herself free, grunts of effort occasionally heard from her direction.
"It's fine, she'll tire herself out eventually. Also, make lots of pictures if you get the clouds right." After all, pillars of smoke rising up from the fighting itself would be kind of neat, even if you still insist they aren't all that necessary.
Before long, you take off, wading into the water a bit before you leap off, throwing yourself into the ocean once it's deep enough. The water is clear, and even this close to the beach, there's a ton of small fish around, scurrying here and there. It's probably the effect of Nessie being around and eating anything that actually threatens them that has so many of them here?
Either way, there's some seaweed growing here and there, too, and it all looks downright idyllic. You definitely get why the New Generica beach is a tourist attraction, far and beyond the locals frequently visiting it. No, if anything, isn't it weird how few tourists there are here?
Regardless, you have some swimming to do to reach the area you noticed earlier. It's faint, really faint, but you also do sense a small bit of magical power up ahead- a sure sign that there's something of interest, if nothing else.
It was hard to notice earlier when you were still on land, but now that you're underwater, that's changed. Maybe the ocean kind of hid it? Or it's the kind of thing that's just very 'at home' in the sea and so hard to tell apart unless you're carefully looking. One way or another, it's moving very slowly, so although you aren't a particularly quick swimmer- you have short and cute limbs, you can't help it- you should be able to reach it soon-ish enough.
You do have to swim out into the open water, of course, the bright light from above making everything look a deep blue as you keep moving further and further away from the coast, as well as deeper down. Normally diving like this wouldn't be possible for you, what with the need to breathe and all that, but as you are magnificently well-prepared, the charm you bought off that elf merchant, Donna, once upon a time is currently on your person, letting you act with impunity.
See, the other three might drown, because they actually came to the beach without any waterbreathing, but you are actually good at this whole magical girl thing.
At any rate, it doesn't take too long for you to find your target, clearing up what was up with those rumors after all- and yet also creating more questions than it answers. For what you find isn't, as you'd initially thought you would, a giant pervert octopus or anything of the sort, but rather… A girl.
A girl with black hair done up in buns and, perhaps more notably, a lower body replaced with huge tentacles like those of an octopus, striped in black and white to fit the weird vaguely Japanese school uniform she is wearing. As you approach, she notices you, her hands hugging one of her tentacles as her face displays an expression of dismay, one of her black eyes a spiraling, magical eye of some sort.
She's kinda cute, actually. Not as cute as you are, but then, nobody is.
Naturally, while this is not entirely what you were expecting, this does at the very least explain the mention of some kind of 'giant octopus' by the sources Melanie quoted for you, presuming said sources were mundane normies and all. A single look at this girl would confuse one of those, but with the Veil and all they may very well interpret what they saw as an unusually and notably large aquatic animal of that sort.
That doesn't really help you much here and now, however. Swimming a bit closer, you inspect the girl you've found, noting the size of her tentacles compared to her human parts and the way she recoils from you, looking at you in fear.
Huh. Is she afraid of human contact in general due to bad experiences? Also, is she an actual monstergirl or a girl that somehow transformed like this? So many questions, but so few answers to go with them.
Well, while you're unable to speak underwater and doubtful of your ability to convince this girl to follow you to the surface to at least question her properly right now, you figure you can do one other thing. Mainly, examine her biology a little closer!
… What? Just because the act of the demented rapist girl meant to fuck with Brian you dropped already was an act doesn't mean it didn't have a bit of the real you in it as well. And just saying, but when given the choice between smashing or passing on this girl, you'd be smashing her all night long.
As such, you summarily disregard the arms cutely held out to try and keep you away, instead diving towards the monochrome-looking girl. She continues to wave her hands at you, but you simply change course slightly, such that you quickly are within reach proper.
Patting the wet cloth of her shirt, you note that the hardened fabric still manages to stay in shape despite the saltwater it seems to have been submerged in for a while, her frilly skirt floating a little in the current helping you stay more or less in place rather than sink down into the depths.
Next, you wiggle one hand under said skirt, the shocked expression she makes in response only making it funnier. Putting a hand on one of her thick tentacles, the slick, surprisingly smooth skin twitching under your touch as the corded octopus muscle under it reacts, you follow it back, finding a nearly seamless point where the girl's thighs stop and the tentacles begin, soft skin giving way to a bloom of marine features.
You also make sure to pat her thighs a bit while you're at it. They're nice thighs, just the kind the Elena part of yourself would have kept around to make their owner give her lap pillows during lunch break.
Your daughter had some good taste, what can you say? And yeah, you've been becoming more cognizant of these things, remembering flashes of not only your life as Jack but that of Elena as well. It doesn't really come up that often and you make an effort not think about it, because of the inherent weirdness of being a fusion between Jack and Elena and yet still having a separate Elena inside your head, but hey, it's a thing.
That aside, though, you also soon figure out a much more important tidbit of information. That being, due to her unusual biology, this girl can't really wear panties, they just wouldn't fit over her tentacle-legs, and so you have full access to her privates, feeling a soft, delicate thing giving way to your fingers as you play with it the moment you touch it.
Her eyes wide as dinner plates, the black-haired girl has stopped even trying to push you away from herself, letting you do as you will now. Long practice lets you easily find her clit with your thumb while you slowly push another finger into her, testing the warm, soft depths hidden beneath-
Eight massive octopus limbs latch onto you from all sides, pinning you down hard. Right. That was still a thing, wasn't it? Now panicking even harder, the girl quickly starts to struggle as she tries to swim up, dragging you along, but only two of her tentacles seem to be doing what she wants them to, the rest still squeezing down on you.
Their suckers sting a little, suctioning onto your skin as they are. It's actually a little ticklish, even.
Naturally, this is a bit of an issue, though hardly anything to get worked up about. Setting your face into a scowl, your lips pressing upwards in concentration, you tense your muscles, forcing the tentacles to-
Forcing them to-
Hey, come on! You're really supernaturally strong here, why aren't they letting go?! Forcefully pushing your arms towards your sides, you keep up the pressure, determined to win against these octopus suckers with the ease you are owed.
Seriously, just how strong are these things? You push and squirm and put all your strength into it, yet you can barely get them to move- the suction these things can apply to stay in place is really insane!
Like, you've broken some of those thick, wooden boards with your bare hands before, as a test, and though it actually hurt your hand like a bitch, you made short work of that wood. However, here and now, you have to really put your all into forcing these things to let go of you.
But let go they do! It takes effort, every ounce of it you have, but your sheer physical strength does let you push the tentacles away, inch by inch. If you were actually fighting something, you'd have already deployed your extra legs (that do not count for biological classifications, meaning having them doesn't make you an insect, just to make this clear) to help cut yourself free, but you're trying to bang this weirdly cute creature, not make calamari out of her.
Once you've got your arms free, you proceed to pull the rest of the tentacles off your body, heedless of the hickey-like marks they leave on your skin as you do. It's not like they last particularly long, either, given your proclivity or quickly healing from any and all imperfection.
… And yes, you are perfect just the way you are. It's a matter of embracing yourself, something everyone should be doing by default. After all, how can you expect anyone else to accept you if you can't even accept yourself? That's the reason you don't pay any mind to the vast majority of background characters this world holds for you, or at least one of them.
By the time you're finally mostly free, only one of the overly thick and muscular tentacles still attached to you, you're tempted to just get right back to what you were doing already, exploring this girl's body in as much depth as your dick allows, only for something unexpected to happen. Well, you probably should have expected it, but you weren't really paying attention to what this octopus girl was doing while you wrangled her lower body.
Simply put, every time you pulled one of her tentacles off yourself, she seems to regain control of it, meaning that she can swim around much easier, tensing up and then undulating them in that way actual octopi (is that the right plural?) do to move through water. At this point, she's managed to drag both herself and you up to the surface, breaking through it and lifting you up with the one remaining limb still wrapped around your waist.
"Are you okay? Did you drown? Did I hurt you?! I'm so sorry!" Arms raised, but this time more because she seems unsure what to do than to ward you off, the girl looking the same age you do is panicking. "I didn't try to- I swear I-"
"I'm fine," you inform her, waving the concern off. "Just wet. Also, hello."
"Ah, uhm…" Looking entirely lost, she continues to hold you aloft, the tentacle still grabbing you the only obviously inhuman part of her above the water. "Hello? I hope I didn't hurt you, but really look… fine…"
"That's what she said," you reply out of sheer principle, crossing your arms as your feet dangle a little, your swimsuit jostled around during the brief kerfluffle just now but still sitting nicely as far as you're concerned. "Why would I be hurt?"
"The last time I accidentally grabbed someone, I broke their arm! And you were underwater for so long I thought I-" She sniffles for a moment, but keeps herself under control in the end. "How could you hold your breath for so long? And, and how did you make my tentacles let go? They never budge once they hold onto anything usually."
You tilt your head, wondering what exactly her deal is. "Magic," you just shrug by way of answer.
"Eh? Magic is real?" She asks, her black eyes wide again, the spinning hypnotic one slowing down its constant motion for a moment.
"How did you think you have octopus tentacles for legs?" You question her, entirely not expecting to have to give a newbie speech today. Heck, you were expecting to eat some seafood and sell the rest off via Brian once you were done with whatever monster lurked at the beach!
… Honestly, that one was on you, in hindsight. Not like Nessie would have just, not eaten it already if it actually was some giant squid or anything. Doing that is kind of her thing.
"I have no idea! It just, happened one day, and it hurt a lot to stay on land after a while, so I got to the beach as quickly as possible. I've been hiding near the beach ever since."
"… What did you even eat then?"
"… I caught a few fish. Sometimes, when the beach is empty at night, I come out and try to cook them, but I think I can eat them raw too?"
Of course. Of course this is what you have to deal with.
"I see," you nod, holding your chin with one hand as you gaze down at her. "Are you sure you stopped transforming?"
"Eh?" Octopus girl stops moving for a moment. "I'm pretty sure I'd have noticed if it kept going… And more importantly, magic is real? Could we get back to that part of the conversation?"
"Magic, monsters, stuff happens," you wave her off. "Focus. Right now, we need to ascertain what is going on with your apparently sudden transformation. You're lucky someone saw you and rumors made it to me so I came to investigate…"
And not at all to stage a beach episode kind of deal with the three musketeers to try and get laid at some point throughout it. No sirree.
"Ah, is that why you approached me? I thought it was strange…"
"Have you ever seen a magical girl anime?"
"Ohmygosh, are you a magical girl?"
"Totally." Gesturing towards her general direction, you try to get closer, only to remember she's still holding you up with one meaty tentacle. "I hunt dangerous monsters and help people affected by magic around here. So trust me, I'm an expert. Now put me down so we can make sure you aren't going to run out of time before we know it."
Of course that's utter horseshit; you don't exactly go out of your way to help people, affected by magic or otherwise. However, you figure calming this chick down a little may do you a few favors, especially as you are absolutely determined to get back under her skirt. And speaking of…
"So that's how you were fine…" She says, obviously deep in thought. "And why you started touching me down there."
"Mhm. Had to make sure it wasn't some tentacle parasite," you lie without batting an eye. "If it keeps spreading, it may be a curse, and that needs different countermeasures."
"Oh thank God, I thought… I thought I may have to stay like this forever," the octogirl says tearfully, suddenly pulling you in close to hug you. Tightly. Too tight!
"That's only if it's reversible," you point out, making sure not to raise her hopes too much. You don't expect she'll manage to regain the ability to attract foot fetishists anytime soon, personally, though you could be wrong. Contrary to what you're claiming, you're not exactly an expert at spontaneous monstrous transformations.
What you are an expert in, however, is the groping of cute girls, and so you quickly get right to work. Sliding both your hands under her skirt again now that you're pressed against her (mostly flat, but not entirely so) chest already, you quickly reestablish the points you were aware of before; nice, soft thighs, huge tentacles replacing them halfway and no panties.
So far, so good.
"Uhm… Do you really have to touch me there?" The girl asks as you return to the meat of the matter, or rather the place you plan to put your meat. "That's a bit… private."
"What if it starts turning? That would be a problem," you point out as you slowly and gently wiggle a finder inside her, parting very human folds to test how she feels, what with her waist and below still being under the water. "Also, it's fine. I'm Jackie, by the way."
"That's a strange name. Oh, and I'm Minako, pleased to make your acquaintance," she replies. "Ah!"
Yup, her clit is still particularly sensitive, her tentacles just twitched.
"It's short for Jacqueline," you explain, slowly pulling at your bikini. With Minako's eyes closed for a moment, you have enough time to get your dick out and ready for action, pumping it a few times.
When she opens her eyes, it is because you're lifting her skirt up, her breath hitching. "Jackie, is that a penis?"
"… No," you lie, nudging it forward. Her legs are by necessity set apart a little just so she has the space for her tentacles, so you can easily position yourself at her hairless and very much human entrance. "It's my magical girl measurement device. I have to use it on you to find out what's wrong with you."
Not waiting for her to reply, you grab her hip with one hand, the other guiding your already hardening cock towards her. It takes you a moment of pushing and prodding, but before long you can get your tip into her, the tentacled girl gasping as her folds are opened up by your bitchy breaker.
Yes, you know how you called it, shut up. You can be plenty bitchy whenever you want.
Slowly pushing into her despite the bad lubricant saltwater makes for, you find that she actually produces enough lubricant of her own to make doing this pleasant, so you soon softly pump yourself into her with both hands on her body to stabilize yourself. Doing this in the open water is difficult, okay?
"Ah! Ah! AH!" Suddenly, you're enveloped by white and black tentacles once again, except this time they aren't aggressively clutching you in some instinctive hunting behavior, they're almost… caressing you now, sliding over your skin and pulling on your butt to make you fuck their owner.
Suffice it to say, you are very happy to oblige. Minako is small and tight whereas your dick is huge and fat, and so it is a lot of work to carefully work yourself into her, but you are nothing if not motivated at the 'challenge' presented.
Clutching you tightly, the octo-pussy is quivering around you, her arms somehow stuck between pushing you away and drawing you in. "Ah! Jackie! This is sex! We are having sex!"
"Ngh," you grunt, thrusting your throbbing dick deep into her- you think you can feel her womb ahead already and you want to conquer her entirely before you put a baby into her! "Taking measurements. With sex. Your tentacles don't complain."
"I can't control them when they're like this, they do things on their own!" Well, they do technically have sub-brains in normal octopi, you think? No idea how that works here, but hey, you ain't no magical biologist. Being a magical girl is enough on your plate already.
"Well they want us to have sex. Can't help it." With that, you really lean into them, stroking the bases of the tentacles you can reach as you slam your hips forward and back, trying your very bet to just screw Minako as hard as you can. She, for her part, moans at this, unable to help herself as her insides squirm around your cock, now buried deeply enough to let you confirm her womb is in fact intact.
Good thing, too. You were wondering about that. How great that your purely scientific curiosity has been satisfied.
Now about breeding her like a sleeping Olivia. You're good at that. Though even the greenette's body doesn't actually support you doing so as thoroughly as Minako's…
By the time you endeavor to stop seeding the girl you found in the water, there is a small adjustment to your respective positioning; while you are still clutched tightly to her chest, there is a very much swollen, bloated belly pressing against your stomach, the soft and delicate skin of her inflated midsection making itself known.
Look, you produce tons of semen and you were knotting her, of course this was gonna happen. The only issue, though, is that her tentacles are still keeping you in place, making it so that you can't pull out even if you wanted to.
Granted, pulling out is not high on your priority list, but poor Minako has gone past being surprisingly into this and just slumped over onto your shoulders, groaning every time the load deposited into her grows by another couple spurts.
It is all that creates any real distance between you now, as her belly is… well, pretty big now. Feels kind of nice where it touches you, though.
"Jackie… Did you… get a result yet…?"
Ah, right. You were supposed to be doing a thing, weren't you? "Mhm, results inconclusive, but it doesn't seem to be a progressing condition," you mumble, feeling the ocean water wash up against both of you. To be honest, without her tentacles, you never would've been able to just have sex in the open water like this, you're not that good of a swimmer.
"That's good, I guess," Minako chuckles breathlessly, wheezing a little in her cutely high voice as she feels her belly with both hands. "Ooh, so heavy…"
That's what she said. You will never stop thinking this every time someone says anything vaguely like that.
"Need to take you home with me. Figure out what exactly happened to you and what to do about it."
"… Are you sure you aren't a kidnapper after all? That's something a kidnapper would say."
"I am the kiddest of nappers," you declare almost on instinct, your conflicting urges to make dad jokes fighting against the part that wants to keep octopus pussy on tap. "But I'm serious, I got someone that knows more about this stuff and some equipment and stuff there."
Minako makes a sound that indicates she knows what you mean, while also being weirdly adorable. Like some kind of… aquatic kitten or something. "I can't stay out of the water for long, though. Maybe twenty, twenty-five minutes, but then my skin starts hurting down there."
"We'll figure something out. Do you think you can control your tentacles? I'll need to pull out."
"… I'm going to leak everywhere. Let's not."
You grunt in mild distress. "I'll just make a fish bowl around us then."
Time to strut your cryokinesis stuff a little, you suppose.
You float off and away, bringing with you the weirdly adorable creature your dick is stuck in now. Forming a shell made of body-temperature ice is simplicity itself for you, even though it requires a bit of upkeep to keep it from melting in the actually kind of cold ocean water, and before long you are back near the beach.
Sadly, gathering your stuff seems like a lot of trouble right now, so you end up having to delegate the task. Luckily, the terrific trio is still there, having transformed to don their magical girl uniforms when they saw you floating along from afar.
"Jackie?" Olivia asks clutching her spears, having spied you through the clear ice you created. "Is that you? Are you okay?"
"Of course I am," you say, as though being positively covered in tentacles to the point only your head peeks out was entirely normal for you. Well, to be fair, you just decided it is, so there's that. "This girl is why we came to the beach today. She was suddenly transformed into this and she can't control her monster parts, which is why she needed help."
Shyly raising a hand, Minako waves it once before pulling it back in. "H-hello…"
"I'll bring her somewhere else, but my hands are pretty full with that." You shrug your tentacle-covered arms to illustrate the point. "Bubbles, can you take my stuff when you're all done and-"
"I'll do it," Kerrie volunteers. "If Bubbles does it, chances are you'll get it back covered in… fluids."
"Good point. Kerrie, you're responsible for my stuff today. You can eat the ice I left in the rucksack, too." You even went and put some of the cooling packs you ended up gathering from random houses in the Overcity so your frozen treats could remain frozen without you, which may just come in handy now. "Now excuse me-"
"Ah~n!" Minako cries out as you try to reposition, see where you're going and all that.
"Are you okay?!" Kerrie asks, immediately on the lookout for trouble.
"Mh~, sorry, it's just… Jackie…"
"Her underside is sensitive and I can't help rubbing up against it," you call out over the rim of the open fishbowl you are currently inhabiting. "Now let's go, the sooner we get your tentacles under control the sooner I can stop."
You end up having to stop twice on the way to the alleyway containing the twilight portal to the Overcity (you're calling it that because it's active in the hours of twilight, not because of that sparkly vampire novel thing, for the record) because Minako ends up clutching at you too tightly.
That is to say, she keeps on coming around your cock, what with your knot keeping you as deep inside of her as possible, and you're kind of distracted by that. You also may or may not come a time or two more yourself, but that's a totally different story that doesn't have to be noted all that much.
Though you do have to kind of hug onto her belly just to stay in place at this point. She's not looking, like, completely pregnant and ready to give birth, but she definitely has a belly, you know?
But, well, anyways, you don't take all that long to carry-fuck her all the way to your home. She does remark on the eerie silence of the Overcity once you pass through the portal, but you just explain to her it's a sort of side-dimension and not to worry about it.
That and a few grinding mini-thrusts keep her occupied with more important stuff.
The exact logistics of actually getting her to let go once you're home (and the sparse sounds of the forest, still without any rustling leaves as there's no wind in the Sprawl that you've found so far) are… complicated, of course. Complicated and in no way funny.
"Okay, deep breath, then try to relax your whole body!"
"Uuungh…!" Her face screwed up, Minako tries to follow your instructions. "I can't! It's not working! It's too big inside me!"
"This is not about your pussy, it's about your legs!" Frustrated, you start poking the base of her tentacles right around where they grow out of her thighs. "You just have to-"
All of a sudden, they all let go. Not having expected as much, you drop from their grasp, right to the bottom of your self-made fish bowl.
Your very slippy, very wet fish bowl made of perfectly smooth ice.
You do not nearly drown in your own sperm because you slip on it and need Minako's help getting up above the water's surface again. Anyone that says otherwise is a liar that shall swiftly be punished with a bullet to the head. Minako, too, shall never truthfully claim any of these events to be factual, on pain on surprise butt sex applied right then and there.
You tell her as much as you float her along inside the thing, the water currently very white as load after load of yours spews out of her. For some reason, she is very embarrassed by this.
Finally, however, you can present your field findings to the expert of such things known only as the enigmatic researcher, Brian, also called Doctor Brianchuu. He happens to be inside the house rather than down in the basement for once, too, already awaiting your arrival.
"Chuuh, Jackie, why is a female monster suspended in a solution of your semen inside the house?"
"There is a perfectly normal and legitimate reason for this, I swear."
Minako just clasps her hands over her face, blushing brightly enough you can see it anyway. Her tentacles are fiddling with each other's tips, too, which strikes you as weirdly cute.
"Chuuh, so let me get this straight. You found her, immediately proceeded to have sex with her and only then thought to bring her here to let her be examined in a professional capacity?"
"I have priorities and I act according to them," you declare, arms crossed. "Besides, it really calmed her down. Once she was half-conscious from concurrent orgasming and all."
"… Puchuuh, I guess you were only acting so much all this time… But don't mind me, the girl you found still needs to be dealt with."
"Uhm…" Hesitantly raising a hand, Minako, who is pushing herself halfway out of the receptacle you crafted to transport her across the city's airspace, interrupts you. "Sorry to bother you, but it feels very strange to be talked about in the third person like this when I am right next to you."
Right, right. You're down in the basement right now, inside a blank white room Brian apparently uses for diagnostics or something. The first thing he did when you told him to look at this girl you brought was to, somehow, open the floor in front of your house up like some kind of random pitfall, the ground splitting up and receding to allow you passage downwards.
Apparently, his continued efforts to reconstruct and rebuild your home included ways to deal with huge monster corpses and how to get them down here, among other things. You refuse to question how it works exactly, as long as it doesn't start randomly opening up under you or something. Brian probably knows what he's doing.
Long story short, he did some scans or something, a machine arm took a skin sample from Minako quickly and painlessly enough she didn't notice at first and here you are.
"Chuh, my apologies. I am rather new to the concept of treating patients as people," Brian courteously lets her know. "However, if you would like to know about the results of preliminary testing, I do believe analysis should be complete now, chuuh."
"… I'm a person, it's alright, I'm not offended…" Minako mutters. You just go over to pat her back consolingly while Brian messes with a part of the wall, causing a pedestal to rise from under himself that positions him at about normal human height, whereupon a section of the wall unfolds, the part coming off on a hinge revealing itself to be a uselessly intricate keyboard with a screen behind it.
"Puchuh, according to what we can tell from this, this girl seems to have awakened monstrous traits due to a combination of genetics and a latent talent for magic. It was not an outside factor, but rather her natural state of being that caused her to mutate in this manner."
"So you're saying someone in her family banged a monster octopus and kept the kid?" You ask for clarification.
"Puuh, or a female monster. In fact, the likelihood of this possibility is higher, as she retained most of her form rather than undergoing a full-body transformation."
"Uhm… Excuse me? Does that mean this," Minako asks, gesturing at her tentacle-legs, "cannot be fixed?"
"Chuh, there is nothing to fix. You are in perfect physical health as your magic sustains and empowers yourself, as with most monsters. Except for slight malnutrition, I believe."
"Well, I was only eating a few fish here and there… But, uh, is there really nothing that can be done?"
Brian tilts his head at her, so you jump in. Because you are actually helpful, contrary to some other people you shall not name. "Any way to let her live normal human life, she means."
"Chuuh, I see. Some monsters can learn to transform into a less monstrous form temporarily, which may be the key to doing what you speak of," Brian tells you, turning around after giving the screen and the random symbols racing across it one last look. "However, this is usually the domain of both powerful and intelligent monsters, hence I doubt your new friend qualifies off the bat, puchuh."
"… I see. Then, if magic is real, how can I become strong enough to learn?"
"Monsters generally increase in strength by acting according to their nature, puchuh. The rates at which they do so vary greatly, however, which is why stronger ones are relatively rare. Then some are born stronger due to their species, other factors can manifest themselves and more, but that is all you need to know right now." Leaning in, entirely pointlessly as you stand right next to her, Brian then whispers towards Minako. "If Chuhackie knew how to breed stronger monsters, she would definitely do so and inevitably lose control of them."
"Hey!" You complain. "I'm not that bad!"
"… Chuh, have you seen the forest outside?"
"That doesn't count!"
"… Will I have to live in the ocean after all?"
"Meh," you wave that entire notion off, "we'll figure something out for you."
"In that case… Is there any way for me to make a call to Japan in the immediate future?"
"Otou-san, it's me."
"Yes, it's really me, it's really your Minako."
"I got lost, but that is not important right now."
"No. Listen. I know we never talked about it, but this is important. Who was mother and what happened to her?"
"It is relevant because I have big, black and white tentacles and was lost in the ocean for two. Months. Because I suddenly required salt water as an environment and had no idea what was going on."
"Wha- No, you will not come find me right away. Otou-san, we talked about this, you cannot ignore the shareholders on a whim for me! And you do not even know where I am!"
"On America's west coast, I believe. I never got the name of the city I washed up in."
"You. Will. Not. Abandon the company and search for me right now. I forbid it. In fact, I vow to keep on eating naught but raw fish for another two months if you do."
"What else did you think I ate while drifting along ocean currents? And to return back to the original point, daddy, did mother have tentacles or not?"
"Did she ever mention anything about dietary requirements, temperature preferences, how she lived? Anything at all?"
"WHAT DO YOU MEAN SHE WAS A SUMMER FLING?! I CANNOT BELIEVE YOU FATHER!"
"How could you impregnate a woman and then fail to keep in contact with her? You utter lowlife!"
"I do not care! If you have sex with her and wish to keep her in your life, you dive into the water after her if you have to! What were you even doing, useless otou-san?!"
"Yes, I know it never seemed to be relevant. Until it was. Now I have tentacles for legs and have to find a way to retract them."
"Don't worry about me, I have found friends and am currently staying in another dimension. What do you mean you were trying to- Of course you would attempt to track the call."
"Listen, I will attempt to contact you again, but I am in an unfamiliar place and have to rely on someone that looked out for and helped me for the moment. I am rather quite busy and will remain so for the foreseeable future."
"Yes, yes, your Minako is all grow up already. No, I will not leave you otou-san, I will come back to Japan sooner or later. But traveling is out of the question right now and you cannot suddenly stop being the CEO."
"No, you will stay right where you are and do your job. In fact, give the phone to your secretary, I have to talk to her too."
"Otou-san, I know you have a relationship with her, that is why I am asking. Someone has to take care of you while I am gone."
"… No, I am not mad at you. Nor at her. I just wish you made some better life choices so this entire situation would have been far more manageable."
"I love you too."
While you leave Minako to herself for the moment (and take a quick break to eat some chocolate, you're positively famished after all that sex), you and Brian quickly go on to deal with her accommodations. By which you mean you create a dozen or so ice golems and have them dig out a large, rectangular pit in the ground near your house while Brian commandeers another one.
It's a bit difficult to just dig out a bunch of space like this without accidentally breaking into either the Overcity's sewers or the tunnels the… That certain things have dug around the area, but thankfully a place has been found for it.
It's relatively nearby and all, so all that remains is to construct everything. That is to say, Brian has your golems install plates of metal, heaters, walls, a few walls and a ceiling, then fill the until now empty pool with water through a pipe laid out quickly (you have no idea where the water comes from and you aren't sure you want to know), followed by dumping two huge-ass sacks of industrial salt inside.
"Chuuh, not quite ocean water, but close enough, monsters are rarely particularly picky about this. At worst we may need to add some algae regularly, chuh."
"Good enough?" You shrug, not particularly invested into the details here. So long as the girl you spent what feels like half the day fucking can live here comfortably, you don't really care about the rest. Although… "Is there any way to connect this place to the ocean somehow? Let her go to and from the sea?"
"Puchuh, that would make things easier, but there is no way without a naturally-formed portal," he informs you. "If you found one, we could likely connect it to the pool, but otherwise you are chuh out of luck."
Meh. You expected as much, but that still sucks. Ah well, maybe you'll go searching for something later- if nothing else, Beach Episode Two: Electric Sheep Boogaloo is always possible.
Still, though, you're impressed with how quickly your golems can work. Them having the power to just transform their limbs into any tools they need probably has something to do with that, but even just their considerable physical capabilities are pretty immense.
You wonder… What else could you have them build, given the required oversight by an actually sapient being that knows what they're doing.
It has taken you quite a bit of time, when you try to think back on when exactly you started this project, having envisioned and investigated the concept shortly after you became a magical girl in the first place (so… a couple months, you think, you don't exactly keep a diary about this stuff), but now, finally, you have completed a prototype.
Yes indeed, you have created nothing else than your official 'Get-Out-Of-Jail-Free-Card'. This handy-dandy device is a must-have in any upstanding citizen' wallet, after all you never know when someone may try to go and detain you for unlawful weapon possession, murder, disobeying traffic laws or any such made-up excuses. Not that this ever happened to you, of course, despite your 'hobbies'- you were a white man driving a medium to expensive car, after all- but it never hurts to be careful.
All joking aside, though, you are fully aware that no matter how immensely powerful you are, even you can suffer bad luck, get screwed over by circumstances or just straight out need to nope out of a fight or situation in general at a moment's notice. That's what your newest invention is for.
And it's worth calling a proper invention, too. A literal card of sorts, hardened paper anyways, covered in a crapton of symbols from top to bottom drawn in slightly reddish-black ink. You needed the space and made use of as much of it as you could, having carefully manipulated a pen holder made of ice and controlled using your magic instead of your less accurate hands in order to place these runes a required.
In what is technically a circuit board of sorts connecting the many detailed instructions and nested conditions require for this thing to work, you have created what is honestly the probably most complicated runic enchantment you have even envisioned to date. It also requires a lot more juice than anything else you've ever done before, only glowing up with the faint hum of magic you can sense when you push a silver coin at, then into the thing.
You know, you'd almost be giddy at making it work if you weren't halfway convinced Brian made the 'paper' you're using for it out of human skin or something. But, well, you needed something capable of taking in the magic you want to work and the normal stuff didn't relly do the trick, so…
You just decided not to ask any questions and he decided not to give any explanations. Simple as that. To be honest, it's still weird and refreshing for him to actively help you achieve the things you are trying to by giving you the materials you need like this.
Still, progress. It is being made. Now if only you could make these things work across dimensions… But for the time being, you figure the most dangerous places and beings you may encounter are more likely to be found in the Overcity, rather than the real world.
Call it experience talking, but both the… The bug den and the catgirl cafe make kind of a trend. Oh, sure, that second one is likely totally safe and all, but just in case you accidentally find yourself tied up in some BDSM dungeon kind of deal, well, you'd guess that would be more likely to happen in this particular dimension.
So designating your home as the destination spot it is. Better safe than sorry.
With your newly acquired last minute safety mechanism securely tucked away in the waistband of your panties (you do need to make sure it's always available at a moment's notice, after all), you quickly take a moment to consider your phone's memo app, which is where you've put together your personal to-do-list.
Hey, you have a lot of stuff to do and a lot of ideas for things to do, you have to organize this whole mess somehow. It's not like you have some eidetic memory and just remember your plans from dawn 'til dusk.
And no, that was not a reference. There is no literature that fits that bill, no books named in this way, and anyone that says otherwise simply hasn't understood how relationships work. Not that you should be one to talk, considering how things worked out between yourself and Elena's mother.
… Now if only you actually recalled how things did work out between you. You still don't have a full recall of parts of your life even now, so no idea if or when that will change; all you know for sure is that she wasn't in the picture at some point for some reason.
Meh. If you can't remember, it can't be all that important, now can it?
Now, about your to-do-list… 'Do beach episode' is very much taken care of, as is refilling your stock of Tabitha's cat food (you checked to be sure, but the golems you habitually send out to retrieve provisions did their job properly), gathering more of the various bioluminescent fruits growing in your backyard for your own food (the golems again, under Chuckie's supervision), a few minutes of playing with Mirasol (she's got a cute baby tummy, literally), doing the laundry…
No, wait, you never do the laundry, you just write it down to feel like you will at some point. One of the advantages of wearing conjured clothes all the time, you can just make more of them appear whenever you want and let the old stuff vanish.
You know, you get the feeling you used to do a lot more chores back when you were nearly two meters tall. Heh. Not like you could've asked Elena to do that stuff, it was hard enough to get her to clean her bedroom up regularly.
Why do I get the feeling you're saying something about my girl power?
Nothing like that. You just had standards before you merged with your daughter, and one of those standards was a refusal to let her discarded clothing stack up to knee height.
I picked that stuff up! Eventually!
Because the choice was to either sort her own underwear out or risk her father doing it. On a related note, Hello Kitty panties sure never go out of style, do they…?
Moouuu! What about now? Our bedroom is just a giant mass of pillows and stuff!
You will never do anything about that and you will blame Elena for it. You obviously got certain tendencies of hers imprinted upon yourself when the thing happened.
At any rate, while a little talk plays out inside the back of your head, you're still probing through the things you ended up wanting to do at some point, deleting a few here and there as you realize that they are, in hindsight, probably not worth your time. Or just bad ideas to begin with.
Really, though, why would you ever want to steal an industrial palette of tooth paste? You don't brush your teeth anymore, were you planning on doing some homebrew chemistry or something?
You probably were more than half-asleep when you typed this one in.
Ah, there you go, one of those things you actually should be doing. 'Pay Melanie a visit'. That sounds important and you should be doing it more frequently as it is, so…
Off, off and away! In the Jackiemobile! Or riding on an ice platform at least, if nothing else. Though you kind of want to ride on a huge ice statue of yourself now that you think about it.
Eh, maybe later. It would take a while to get every part of your own luscious beauty just right after all, wouldn't it?
Jeez, stop bringing that up already! I called myself that one time!
Melanie Mordors was wondering if, perhaps, this was just her life now. No, seriously, just how many time could crap like this happen? It wasn't like she went around looking for trouble, it just kind of naturally came up when she did her usual thing.
How exactly this led to her sneaking into the local university's administrative offices to snoop around after hearing some weird rumors, accidentally hanging a professor that she was pretty sure was pressuring some students into sleeping with him with his own necktie, a car chase with the man's body inside the trunk of his own car she was driving despite not knowing how to drive and escaping from what she was pretty sure was some mafia assholes that the now dead professor owed money to, finally culminating in a tense Mexican standoff inside an old warehouse during which she used her trusty scissors to cut the power lines and plunge everyone into darkness so she could sneak away unharmed…
Look, it had been a long day, okay? And the worst part was that she was getting used to this kind of thing. Let the mafia guys deal with the body, it was their problem now, whereas Melanie had just stolen one of their cars in exchange she was going to drop off one neighborhood removed from her home before she finally had some dinner.
All in a day's work, she supposed. Like, look, she wasn't one to proscribe who could sleep with whom, she had sex with Jackie for goodness' sake, but if you went around forcing others that was a bad thing, okay? And she liked to think that, sometimes, karma happened to bad people. So if she was looking to expose the guy in the newspapers or something only to inadvertently stumble over him wearing nothing but his stupid necktie and right next to the university's cafeteria conveyor belt for used dishes…
Adding one to one to reach two was a lot of what she did normally. She just applied her way of life in a practical manner at that point. Also, she really needed some damn brain bleach after seeing his shrively, disgusting man-dick.
There used to be a time where Melanie thought she was straight. That time was before Jackie stuck her penis into her concept of attraction and sex. Now she had some actual standards, thanks to her cute, pretty, fun-sized little girlfriend with a giant, ribbed-for-her-pleasure cock, and most men just didn't measure up to that.
And speak of the devil-
"Hello? Hey Jackie, what's up? Yeah, sure, we can meet up anytime. Right now? Uh… Gimme a sec until I reach a street sign."
Remember kids, don't phone while driving. Do as Melanie says, not as she does.
"… You know, Jackie, you're a lot more verbose than usual."
Melanie's comment, made in the middle of your meal, has you stop chewing on your fries for a moment. The two of you are sitting in the same diner you visited together once before, still pretending nothing particularly untoward is going on, something you're quite fine with considering the food is pretty good.
Not great as such, but they make it cheap and hearty here, all the while the kitchen smells comparatively clean to your enhanced senses. Can't really ask for anything more from a place like this.
Swallowing your current bite and your thoughts on various eateries you would rather blow up with giant icicles than set a single foot into both, you tilt your head at your dark-haired, slender girlfriend. "Guess I am. Brian was begging me to talk more, on his knees and all, so I took pity on him."
"Ah. The plush toy mascot thing, right?" You nod, confirming that Melanie is thinking of the right Puchuu. "Guess he's doing some things right, at least. So, uh, how's it been going for you recently?"
"Pretty well," you shrug. "I blew up my P*kemon rival recently and rescued a stranded girl that suddenly grew monster parts out on the beach."
"So that's what the giant squid thing was about?" She asks, holding out another piece of deep-fried potato for you. You get up off your seat halfway to reach it with your mouth, nomming onto it straight from her fingers.
"Giant octopus actually, but yeah. Turns out she's originally from Japan and just kind of swam all the way here while confused and catching fish along the way."
"Whoah. That sounds like a pretty crazy story, actually. Does this kind of thing happen often?"
You wave one hand left and right in a 'so-so' kind of gesture. "Kinda? Like, it's not the usual, but it's not super unheard of either. Rare, but possible if you got a bit of monster in your family tree."
"Ugh. I'm not sure if I even want to know. Aren't monsters, like, rape animals and stuff?"
"Some are. Some are mostly human too, though. Magical genetics are weird." Done saying that, you eat some more fries. You got a large order for a reason.
"Also, I have to ask. Your Pokemon rival?" Melanie smiles, eyebrow quirked.
"P*kemon, that part's important. I keep on beating his weird magi-tech robots with my summons and pets, but he refuses to give me half of everything he has on him." You pout, making your girlfriend chuckle so much she has to cough a little, taking a sip from her coke to play over it.
Once she's cleared her airway a little she continues smiling, however. "So that's why you blew him up?"
"Yup. Happens every time, he's that kind of rival character. He sets up shop, I find him, we have a P*kemon fight and he loses, so he activates the self-destruct. You heard about that hospital gas explosion?"
"Wait, that was you? Or him, rather. I did notice I told you about the place, but…"
"Yeah. That's why I run him off usually, before he can start human experiments on a large scale."
"… You know, the world sure is one fucked-up place sometimes, isn't it?"
"I'd argue it always is. It just doesn't bother us with that most of the time," you shrug.
"Man, here we are all philosophical, huh?" Melanie takes some of your fries, shoving them into her mouth all at once. Personally, you always preferred to eat them one at a time. "I killed a man earlier."
Uh, well, pretty sudden change of topic, but alright. "Good for you?"
"I mean, he was kind of an asshole and a massive creep, who even runs around campus after hours naked except for a necktie? I was originally just investigating him over something I'd heard, but then he started running after me and calling me a cunt so I-"
"Good work," you nod, this time holding a fry out for her. "Being proactive about bad people makes less bad people overall."
Just saying, you may or may not have murdered people over being massive karens that tried to jump the queue at the supermarket and just annoyed you in general. Like, c'mon, you understand that everyone can just have a bad day and all, but when you behave like that, you're basically begging to piss off a serial murderer at some point and be found the next morning with your guts spilled out all over a dark alley.
That's just the natural risks of being a karen. Statistically speaking, you'll bitch at someone that can and will shut you up permanently eventually when you treat everyone around you like that.
The two of you chat a little longer when, after way too short of lovey-dovey time, two chunky guys in suits walk into the diner, eyes hidden behind sunglasses and barely concealed guns under their clothes.
"That's the one. Told you we'd find her with the car."
Melanie hisses. "Shit, I knew I was forgetting something."
Huh. Turns out there's an opportunity for a spot of casual murder right before you, after all.
Naturally, you need to deal with this situation before it can escalate, but in style. After all, why would you ever not do it in a way that makes you look as cool and casual as possible?
As such, you glance outside the diner, through the nearest window. Concentrating a bit (and silently gloating about your wisdom in being transformed when out of the house as a matter of course, this would be a million times more awkward if you didn't have access to your magic right now), you cast a certain spell, repeatedly, causing vaguely humanoid figures to take shape out of suddenly sprouting ice.
Nobody inside the diner notices this, as all eyes are drawn to the two people that just came in. And so, when they start to come towards you, obviously bearing ill intent, you simply and casually clap your hands.
"Boys, come in. We got company." As you speak, the door opens again, the two obvious mafia goons turning around to the sight of no less than four huge, broad-shouldered ice golems wearing an imitation of suits of their own, cold faces set into mild scowls as they grab the human men's arms.
"What the-" "Hey, you can't-"
"Sorry for the bother. We'll go take care of this." With a mildly apologetic nod, you pull Melanie with you as you, too, follow your minions outside, delighting in the befuddlement of those present.
Now then, time to go ahead and make an example of these guys. That's just how criminals work, really, you have to show them that there are consequences to messing with you they don't want to risk if you want them to piss off.
Once again, your past experiences are coming in handy. You never really tangled with organized crime much, of course, but you may have had to make a point or two and make it stick before.
When dealing with those for whom everything is on the table, including murder and worse, you have to generate additional disincentives, beyond what the rule of law provides, if you want them to behave in your presence. Up to and including offing any of them that are going to refuse accepting that you can and will fucking murder them if they give you a reason.
Once those ones are dealt with, the rest usually manage to respect you and your boundaries appropriately. It'd be a different story for anyone that doesn't basically do this kind of thing as a hobby already anyways, but hey, that's a whole 'nother story.
For now, murder time. Which also make you a little horny now that you've fused with Elena, but really, you barely even needed this added incentive to take the opportunity presenting itself here yourself. It's been way too long since you balmed your nerves with some casual murdering.
The two men you ended up grabbing are held in the air by the golems you conjured, wrists, ankles and mouths tied with a sudden case ice-block-itis to ensure they can't do anything and, in particular, won't scream for help or anything like that. As what amounts to professional criminals, they really shouldn't do anything like that out of professional pride, but you figure you may as well ensure they won't embarrass themselves unduly.
They're done for either way, of course. They fuck with your girl, you fuck them hard. And also fuck them up, whatever.
The two wiggle and try to get loose, but that doesn't really get them anywhere in the icy grasp of your minions, and so you quickly reposition your little group towards the nearest dark alley with a convenient dumpster to leave bodies inside of in a hurry.
Normally you'd never just do that, of course- you need to properly dispose of bodies, which for you usually meant hacking them into manageable bits and then going from there. Trash bags may or may not get involved, too, to more easily transport the resulting trash, but whether you ended up burying it in the woods or throwing it into the ocean it usually worked out.
You also sometimes just fed it to some wild dogs that liked to hang around a particular area out in the wilds. They were, y'know, wild and all, but once you taught the pack to respect you by shooting the first one that tried attacking you way back when you started to just use the woods for corpse disposal (it took three damn magazines' worth of your pistol's bullets to put it down, but that's just wild animals for you you suppose) there wasn't any particular trouble from them.
Hey, you brought them food, they made sure nobody found the bodies, it was a win-win.
But back to the present, and the increasingly little care you have for mundane investigators finding any traces of you. "Okay, Melanie, time for human anatomy 101."
"Uhm… Are you sure?" Your girlfriend asks, still fingering that pair of scissors she's carrying inside of her jacket's pocket. "Shouldn't we just ditch these guys somewhere and leave?"
"Nah, you have to make an example with these types of guys," you explain to her, confidently waving one of your guns around in front of their wide eyes as the mafia goons try to scream or shout through their gags. 'Try' being the operative word here. "So we carve 'em up and leave them as a warning to whoever they're with. If they're smart, they'll cut their losses, if not then they can't say they weren't warned."
"Wow, I had no idea magical girls were this well-versed in the world of organized crime," your girlfriend snarks, but she doesn't protest as such. "You know, I'd feel bad for them, but their buddies tried to give me lead poisoning for the past couple hours, so…"
"Yeah, they really had it coming," you shrug, pretty much unconcerned about the specifics there. They're here, their people vaguely pissed you off by messing with Melanie, what more reason do you need to off them? "Okay, so take your scissors and cut where I point. We'll go over where to cut to disable someone, then work our way through the human body's many vulnerable spot from there so they don't die too quickly."
The girl you brought along for this hesitates for a moment, the abject cruelty apparently mattering to her on some level, at least. You don't really follow why most people react like that- once you've decided to kill someone, there's no real point to treating them as anything beyond the wriggling piece of meat they are- but you're generous and patient, so you'll work her through this.
"Just think about what they'd do to a cute girl like you if they could."
Just like that, Melanie pulls her scissors on them, the innocuous arts and crafts kind of tool glinting ominously in the light of the streetlights shining into the alley as if to announce its intent. "You know, Jackie, you always know just what to say to me," she comments, threateningly snapping her scissors. "I'm pretty sure these cut through bone as easily as stone, so let's get started."
By the time you're done with them, the pair of idiots that had the bad luck to hit upon yourself look more like limp, bloodied dolls than living human beings now that their tendons have been, by and large, cut through, their limbs hanging in the air as they remain held up by your silently jeering golem minions.
They don't bleed that much, as of yet, as you were making sure not to have Melanie cut any major arteries, but they've generally stopped struggling as their juices are dripping all over them, and not in the good way. Their muscles and still twitching on occasion, but they can't really move, amply demonstrating the veracity of your experience when it comes to grievous bodily harm.
"… Do you think we should leave one of them alive? You know, as a message?" Melanie asks as she finishes permanently hamstringing the second guy, angling the cutting tool that does, in fact, cut through flesh and bone just as easily as most other things carefully to avoid snipping through too much of his foot in one go.
"Dunno, pretty sure they won't make it long if we leave them anyway," you point out with a shrug.
"Guess you're right. Ugh, I really wanted to leave one of them so he could tell whoever finds them not to bother me ever again."
Hmm… Wait a second, don't you have that one old potion left lying around, from when you first met Brian? Then again, you also do love to just hoard everything you can get your grubby hands on, so is it really worth it to you to waste it on this guy like that?
In the end, what is found inside that alley is a pair of frozen-over corpses, the numerous cuts all over their bodies making fairly clear that they did not die any natural deaths. Authorities would identify them as connected to organized crime in due time, officially declaring the incident to be a dispute among criminals gone out of control.
The exact details aren't really important to you, what with the Veil confusing things to an extent anyways. You and Melanie left the place with a spring in your steps, with you actually going on to show her how to drive properly.
No, seriously, you drove her home, all you needed to do was to add a pair of extended ice blocks to your feet so you could reach the pedals. And a bit of ice under your butt so you could see what was going on outside the car properly.
No, you are not short. The car was just built incorrectly.
Once that's all done and Melanie safely deposited at her home (as opposed to your own, but you don't think she'd appreciate being obtained in a more direct manner at this time), you drive the insulting and unnecessarily large vehicle straight into the woods, then leave it there.
After scratching 'Jackie wuz here' into its roof with a pointy chunk of ice, of course. You're surprisingly good at detailed work like that thanks to all the practice you're getting carving runes into stuff using your magic.
With that last bit of business complete, you hop up and conjure a little platform under your feet, cruising off at Jackie speed. It's been a surprisingly long day, about high time you get home and rest a bit.
Not like there's anything super important to do before you head ba-
Ah, crap, you knew you were forgetting something. Something so important, so central to everything you are that its lack feels like a painful reminder of what the world fails to provide you with unless made to.
You completely forgot to have sex with Melanie, between the murder and the mafia stuff and catching up with what she's been up to lately.
… Muh.
It was, it had to be said, a difference of night and day. Not that she was out of the water, by any means, but at least now it was heated to a nice temperature.
Minako hadn't even realized just how cold the Pacific Ocean could be, having stopped feeling said cold fairly quickly thanks to her strange new biology at the time, but submerging herself in the warm water of the indoor pool that was to serve as her home for the moment was deeply pleasant, in a way she found hard to describe.
Maybe it was because she was Japanese and hot springs were the equivalent of religious ecstasy for her by definition, or maybe whatever monstrous lineage she hailed from originally did prefer warmer waters to begin with. Either way, she much enjoyed this state of affairs, suffice it to say.
Another great improvement in her circumstances, now that she was considering them, was that she had access to actual food now. Yes, she could simply drift through the ocean and trust her tentacles to sift through the water, catching any small fish that came into reach, eating them raw was not how she preferred to cover her dietary needs, whether she somehow could do so or not.
Also, tuna, as a species of fish, were very large and tasty, but also very rude and sometimes aggressive. Accidentally fighting a school of them had earned her a few bruises, though the resulting catch had also fed her for several days all the while being easier on her palate than the usual, smaller fish she caught in this manner.
But all of that was behind her now and she didn't have to think about the literal months she had spent aimlessly drifting through the sea, riding the currents and trying to avoid anything that was larger than herself (and frightening such things off with a good grab and slap by her lower body on an occasion or two). Now, finally, she could enjoy the luxuries of modern society once more!
She had talked to the girl that seemed to be keeping order in Jackie's domain already, Chuckie was her name, and together they had rummaged through the kitchen of the only house standing amidst this mystical forest in the middle of an otherworldly city. Like that, Minako had quickly availed herself of the housekeeper's cooking, humble fried rice with egg, some chicken and assorted local vegetables being enough to almost drive her to tears.
After all the raw fish, she thought she might never have another opportunity to consume prepared food, so she could be excused for such, in her own humble opinion. Also, while it was not quite the same as she was used to, the soy sauce that had been used in the dish very much reminded her of home.
Then came the pudding made of local fruits, the ones that seemed to be growing all around the magical forest her current home stood inside of as well, sweet and delicious in ways she could hardly put into words. It had been so long… So long since she'd last eaten sweets…
And no, she was not obsessing over sweets and desserts, Minako was just a girl. It was her natural state of being and any who disagreed were obviously insensitive, male and were never going to get a girlfriend.
…Her own father included. His secretary did not count and the less was said about how he met her mother, the better.
Now here she was, relaxing in her heated swimming pool of a habitat and finding herself far more relaxed than she'd been in months. "Haaah…"
Then, the door opened. "Oh, hey, this is new. Who're you?"
Looking up, Minako saw what seemed to be a nearly naked female, her privates and limbs covered with tight 'garments' made of leaves the only thing obscuring her skin which was a color somewhere between grey bark and dark plants itself.
Her black hair also grew in the form of thorny vines and wide leaves in turn, her pink eyes and pointy ears confirming she was not human in case there was any doubt left. Then again, neither was Minako herself.
"Greetings," she said, subconsciously calling upon the manners with which she had been raised, different language or not. "My name is Minako, I have recently found myself on these shores after a lengthy series of events. Am I correct in assuming you are a fellow inhabitant of Jackie's home?"
Note to self, she truly did need to find out her savior's full name. Not only was she a little uncomfortable addressing her by her first name, she was halfway convinced 'Jackie' was a nickname rather than a full one. Not that she was opposed to such a thing on any principle she held, she merely-
"Yeah, guess you met mommy and this place happened, huh?" Minako's mind blanked for a moment. "Name's Mirasol, nice ta meet'cha!"
"…Mommy? I am afraid to ask, but…"
It was such that Minako met Mirasol, the two striking up a quick friendship as fellow monstrous girls living in relatively close proximity. The incredible revelation that Jackie had children already, however, and more than one to boot as she would soon find out, was rather distracting for the moment.
Yoshikawa Mitsuko (or just Mitsuko, she was getting used to using first names for everything) could not help but tilt her head as she saw something mildly strange, such that she decided to investigate. After all, as a Magical Girl, it was her duty to do so!
Not everything she did under the cover of her identity as an agent of love and justice had to involve the righteous purging of evil, after all. Sometimes, someone just needed an open ear or a kind word, and she took this side of her duties just as seriously as any other!
Hence why she sidled up to the girl she had spied walking along the sidewalk, presumably going home. "Hey Olivia! I didn't see you at school today, are you okay?"
"Oh, hey, Mitsuko," the green-haired girl replied, raising her head to stop inspecting the ground as trod upon. "I'm fine, just a little tired. Had to go help a friend with something today, so…"
Looking at her up close like this, she also noticed another strange detail. For some reason, Olivia's skin… was darker than usual!
Her face going blank, Mitsuko pulled a notepad (investigative purposes only) out of the cute bag she'd taken to wearing (to carry useful items no girl could go without inside of), snapping out a pen with her other hand. "Is that so? Did any of this involve a solarium or, heavens forbid, drugs?"
She knew all about gyarus! They were kind of funny in anime and manga, but bad news in real life! Writing her thoughts down for later review, she began with 'Olivia: Gyaru question mark question mark'.
"Wha- no!" Waving both hands in front of her face, Olivia fervently denied the allegations made. Perhaps… too fervently? "Nothing like- why would you even think that? We were on the beach."
Crossing 'gyaru' out, Mitsuko instead replaced it with 'delinquent question mark', underscoring it twice. "So you were playing hooky to spend the day playing at the beach instead of going to school?"
"No! Or, uh… I guess technically…" She circled 'delinquent' twice now. "But no! We were goofing off a bit, but there was a legitimate reason for it, even if Bubbles just ran off as usual. You can ask Kerrie, she was there too!"
"Mhmm, so what you're saying is your mysterious friend asked you others to come to the beach, where you proceeded to ditch school and play all day to the extent you are tired and tanned from sun exposure?"
It was best to confirm these things properly, after all this mysterious miscreant misguiding this poor girl and her friends may well need a good magical talking to!
"Well it sounds bad when you put it like that, but it totally isn't like that!" The denial was obvious, yet even Olivia had to see that he was being irrational in denying it at this point. "I mean, yes, I totally goofed off making sandcastles for hours, but there was a real, serious reason for why we went to the beach and had a picnic!"
"Yes, yes, I fully and totally trust you." Mitsuko's half-hearted attempt at coaxing Olivia into admitting the truth only made the other girl puff up her cheeks in vexation. "So then, what would said reason be, if it was important enough to miss school over?"
Maybe she was telling the truth, after all. If it was a matter of life and death, perhaps she could even agree with her. Potentially. Or if someone had become a useless shut-in NEET and all their friends were dragging them to the beach as a typical riajuu location to cure their infliction. That was how that worked, right?
"I can't tell you." And just like that, she was sure something was up.
"Reaaally?"
"Really."
"Really really?"
"Absolutely, completely, one hundred percent sure really," Olivia insisted. "Oh, but I can show you the sandcastle I built, if you want?"
Sighing as the poor victim of bad company Mitsuko had found in her friend took out her phone, she shrugged. "Very well, may as well- Holy ravioli, that is one intricate sandcastle."
She had used her time in a literally constructive manner at least, as opposed to hitting on girls that had come to the beach with their boyfriends. Or said boyfriends, depending on whether one viewed it as a case of delinquent-itis or the gyaru flu.
Every day was fun like this lately. Mitsuko wouldn't trade it for anything in the world.
As another fresh new day has… happened, you suppose, and you slowly stumble your way down the stairs, you do come across a sight that is for some reason kind of nice.
Down in your kitchen, where you usually sit around and do your thing around when you get hungry and demand reality grant you sustenance, you find Chuckie, Mirasol and Minako all having a seat, eating fresh, crunchy toast with butter, slightly glowing jam, eggs and even some bacon, the mass production of all these sources of nourishment handily taken over by Chuckie as she also assembles several sandwiches off to one side.
Next to Minako stands a bucket of water, the semi-marine girl's tentacles handling a sponge that is regularly deposited inside to keep themselves moist despite her being on dry land; unsurprising, as you remember her mentioning that she needed to keep herself nice and wet, but it's nice to see that she has a way to at least kind of stay with the rest of you a little longer than normally.
"Oh, hey Jackie! Finally up, sleepyhead?" Chuckie is way too chipper and awake for… You look up at the kitchen clock someone hung up at some time. Eleven o'clock. "We decided to do some brunch kind of thing, would you like to join us?"
"The eggs are delishous and we need birbs," Mirasol informs you, still stuffing her face.
"I hope we did not bother you, but a get-together like this seemed like the perfect idea," Minako says, cleanly finishing off her current bite before she speaks and all. "Not to impose on the state of available groceries and such."
"I told'ya not to worry 'bout it," Chuckie waves her off, raising a plate of assorted toast at your direction. "So, belated breakfast or not?"
"Murgleburgle," you elegantly exclaim, epically describing the inner struggle you face day after day in a world that makes no sense at all, yet still must bow to your strength of will and character both as you stagger into the kitchen proper, tumbling onto your usual seat where you receive slow head pats from… someone. You don't even bother looking up to see who it is.
Also, that brunch of theirs tastes great even for breakfast (y'know, if you're a normal person that doesn't do brunch), and the tea Minako brews for all of you is weirdly delicious. Then again, your experiences with tea are very… limited, to put it nicely, so maybe you aren't the person to ask.
Hot leaf water usually just burns your tongue. How people drink literally boiling liquid like that is beyond you- you already had to let your coffee cool down to acceptable temperatures, still hot but not too hot, back when you still had the kind of taste buds that didn't immediately make you throw up bitter stuff.
You are an ice girl. Hot stuff isn't your forte, not now, not ever. But yeah, Minako is really good at making tea, you shall ask her for more whenever you want something other than the endless cascade of soft drinks you usually pour into yourself to maintain safe levels of hydration.
Some people may consider you to be overly clingy, given the way you just had a date with your girlfriend yesterday evening and you're already back to calling her up, but those people are wrong.
Simple as that. They're wrong, you're right in doing what you do, end of story. Screw 'some people' and their shitty opinions, you can do whatever you want and they can go fuck themselves. Melanie is your girlfriend, how the two of you do stuff is up to you.
It is with this background in mind that you agree to meet up on the roof of Melanie's high school, still dimly remembering it from when you paid it a nightly visit with her that one time. You go*gle it up as you move, though you only really get moving around the time Melanie writes she has her lunch break.
Before that, you're still busy with brunch, which has been promoted to an actual, real meal thanks to Chuckie's cooking. Hey, that Viridian Fruit Jam she made is absolutely delicious, even if you're pretty sure it loses its aphrodisiac properties when processed like this, somehow.
Or maybe you're just so doped up on the stuff you hardly even notice it anymore. You did sneak out yesterday evening to suckle from Viridis' breasts, too, come to think of it- just a little, you just kind of felt like it.
That sap she lactates is just too delicious. It also helps she's more than happy to jerk you off whenever you get some.
You're a simple girl with a big dick, okay?
Anyways, Melanie is already waiting for you as you steer your platform downwards the moment you arrive, holding a sandwich in one hand she's casually eating.
"Hey Jackie, hope you don't mind but I gotta use lunch break," she greets you as you hop off, onto the concrete roof upon which she's standing, leaning against the little box poking out of it containing the entrance to the building.
"'s fine," you wave her off, pulling your own sandwich out of your magical box slung over your shoulder as always. Chuckie made some for everyone, just in case any of you got hungry over the course of the day- she did complain you don't always eat lunch at regular times, or any meals you are't forced to for that matter.
Look, you eat when you're hungry, not your fault you aren't always hungry around the same time. And yeah, maybe you just fill yourself up with sweets, that's just how it is.
It's not 'unhealthy', it's a lifestyle choice!
Both of you are eating together now, no explanation, no further conversation, nothing. It's kind of nice.
"You know, this is kind of nice," Melanie agrees to your current train of thought. "Lunch break is way too long anyways, but spending it together like this makes it much more bearable."
"Mhm," you make, mouth full and all. You finish chewing and swallow before you respond beyond that. "Wanted to ask about news you heard, but we can just stay like this a bit if you like."
Melanie's response to this is to tug on your shoulder until you're leaning against her side, head poking against her waist. "That would be great. What's that sound, though?"
"Muh?" You ask, mildly confused before you realize what she means. "Ah. Just Brian."
You were completely ignoring the muffled protests coming from the bag you are wearing slung over your shoulder, opposite from your box.
A slightly darker look passes over Melanie's face. "Brian. That was the name of the plush mascot that made you a magical girl, wasn't it?"
"Yup." The one and only.
"Good. He sounds like he doesn't like being squashed up inside there."
There' a reason you like her. Her vindictive side may or may not play into that.
So, totally random rumors Melanie heard that may or may not point you towards three particular monstrous threats that have popped up or become known around the city of Grande Generica. Sometimes, you wonder how exactly narrative convenience works out here- you're at least pretty sure that the monsters you hear about through her are there already before you do, it's just that strings are pulled to arrange the timing with which they become a real problem.
By comparison, back when you used Brian to find out about things, he was using sensors he set up around the city, tracing news reports and things like that for anything that hinted at the Veil muddying things up. You wonder if you would receive different results by asking him for any news, actually…
Either way, Melanie does have a few rumors for you to peruse. Number one, a particular park not too far from the first portal you made regular use of is said to be haunted… or infested with unruly kids pulling pranks on people. Using the entirety of your immense, heavy brainmeats, you think about why this niggles in your brain so much.
…
Right, you remember, you think. That park was where Viridis was hanging around before you moved her into your backyard. Did something move in after she left or something?
Well, whatever it is, you'll be the one that has to deal with it; while there weren't any deaths, according to some quick research, several people were reportedly seriously maimed by unknown perpetrators in the area. That more or less screams 'magical stuff be happening here', as far as you're concerned.
Bunch of living witnesses, but no description of who did it? Please, it's obvious something's going on.
For something with a few more actual deaths, there's a place up in the Northern part of the city where a couple people disappeared, next to the area with what amounts to local industry and stuff like that. People just, go to work, then vanish without ever arriving if they pass through the place.
Obviously, that seems promising. It could be some mundane matter too, of course, some random gang or murderer hanging out there, but you doubt it.
Any more details you'll have to figure out for yourself, as per the usual- though Melanie did offer to come with you, help you out with that part of things. As if you couldn't just play detective for five minutes and blow this case wide open, muh!
…Her reaction to you pouting like that is interesting, in that she refuses to let go of your head for the next ten minutes. That said, she's warm and smells nice, so you don't exactly oppose cuddles either.
Last but not least, you have… Nothing.
"Huh. You know, it is a little weird, but I guess it can't always be three things at a time," Melanie shrugs, unaware of the gravity of the situation.
"If it happens thrice, we have a problem." You do not suggest nor question this, you simply state it. "Once is unusual, twice is bad luck, thrice is a pattern."
"If you say so, I guess. I'll make sure to keep an eye and an ear out, but what's so bad about it being a pattern?"
"Think," you helpfully suggest as you start walking back and forth. "Always three new threats, even before I met you, then suddenly this? Something'll happen on the third time."
"So it's some magical number thing? I can see it, not like it's any less ridiculous than magic being a thing," Melanie agrees, subconsciously touching the friendship bracelet you made for her she's still wearing. Good girl.
"May have to unpack the Muh again if it's bad," you theorize, one hand squeezing down where you keep Brian's head under control with an almost literally iron fist.
If there's one thing you've learned, it is not to dismiss your intuition when it clearly warns you of stuff like this.
Sadly, lunch break doesn't last all day, else it wouldn't be call a break and more, like, quitting time or something.
That means that Melanie still has to go back to doing what she was doing, that being attending school, while you are left to ponder what to do, your two now eaten sandwiches symbolizing the loneliness of nobody being around for you to mess with.
You know, if you were inclined to philosophise and shit. Which you aren't.
So instead you pull Brian out of where you've been storing him thus far, letting his body unfold itself to normal size as he hangs in your grasp. "Chuuuuh, never again! Sensory deprivation chambers are what I inflict on others, chuh, not how I spend my time!"
"Shaddap," you order absent-mindedly, shaking him a little. "Your opinion?"
"…Puchuh, if your erection persists past a medically sound time of two hours, consult your-" You proceed to violently squeeze and pull on the thing you're holding. "Chuh, alright, fine, you're likely correct. Expect something big to show up in the near future, puchuh."
"Big as in size or big as in normal size but big danger?"
"The chuh would I know?"
…You know what, fair enough.
"Off to meeting DD next," you officially notificate, pushing Brian back into his carry bag but with his head allowed to poke out of it this time. "You ready?"
"Puchuh, it's the reason I'm here. If I'd known we were taking a detour, I'd have just met up with you right beforehand, chuh."
You tilt your head, the wind this high up letting your hair flutter behind you dramatically. You like your hair, by the way, for it is the best hair- just an idle thought, but not an inaccurate one, who could possibly ever outdo your perfect, white mane that never needs any care from you to remain fabulously silky and beautiful?
But back to Brian. "I don't trust you to walk in a straight line unless incentivized to."
"Chuh now, that is a grave mischaracterization."
"Brian." You look at him, magical girl against Puchuu, and verbalize each word coming from your mouth with utmost care. "We both know you're as much a little shit as I am."
"…" He stares back, working that one over for a moment. "This is either a grave insult or the nicest thing you ever said to me," he finally decides to comment.
"I can multitask. Why not both?" Creating another fresh new ice platform right beyond the edge of the roof, you hop onto it, searching up the address Mitsuko- Dazzling Destruction- sent you when you asked her for that meeting with promises of Brian's presence. "Muh."
Amidst the bustle of the great city of Générique, cars and machines and all such things that simply do not make any sounds in the Overcity normally (which is why you aren't really used to this level of noise as much as you're used to) lies a lovely café whose address you were sent while you figured out the details of the meeting you're headed to right now.
Brian, now freed of his prison inside a too-small bag, is riding on your head as you come inside, taking a quick glance around to case this joint before you go any further. Yeah, you could've sat down outside, but you never take any seats outside if you can help it- you just prefer to eat inside of actual buildings when you actually bother going to restaurants or cafés or what have you.
Unless of course they're sweltering hot because someone forgot to turn on the damn AC. In that case all bets are off, of course. You can deal with people crowding a place, but not if you have to stew in their juices.
No thanks.
But thankfully, none of that is any issue in this case. This café is a cute place, with an ice cream parlor right next door, wide windows that give a nice view of the scenery outside (the street isn't exactly Hollywood material, but it's got relatively little traffic, trees lining it on both sides and what looks like the perfect positioning to have the sunlight falling into it look great at all times of day) and the interior decoration looks nice and clean while still incorporating a good amount of pink and other pastel colors.
In short, it's picturesque, you'd say. It also smells faintly of sugar and fruits, the kind of scent that has you sit up and pay attention lately- This is the kind of place that families and younger girls love, and seeing as you both used to be a single dad family man and are currently kind of fused to Elena, who very much is the primary target group for these kinds of places…
Hey, I can't help having good taste.
Yeah, to put it simply, you like this place. You may just have to come again if Mitsuko's recommendation for the cake holds any water.
As you do not spy any pink hair anywhere (despite the presence of a lot of other pink, they have pink chair cushioning, for Pete's sake), you proceed to go ahead and find a table for yourself, figuring the girl you're here to meet isn't here yet. Naturally, one that has the pinkest cushions around.
No, they do not all look the same, you are the authority on this stuff now and you demand your cushions be the best ones, and that includes the levels of pinkishness involved!
Brian hops off the top of your head now that you've settled down in place, sitting on the table right to your side. "Chuuh, business meetings. How I despchuh them."
"Could be worse," you shrug. "At least there's cake."
Of course just as you assert that this situation, waiting for someone else to show up, isn't all that bad, someone comes to see you. Not unusual, as this is a café kind of place- the waitress really doesn't come as a surprise.
What does come as a surprise is the gasp followed by the ill-disguised squee as the woman steps up to your desk. "Oh my gosh, aren't you cute? I'm sorry, I shouldn't go and say it, but…"
"It's fine, I don't mind" you wave her off, fully aware you are the most cutest being in existence at any one time. Anyone that disagrees or claims to be cuter gets either the glock or the cock, depending on their level of fuckability.
"And who's your little friend?" The waitress asks, looking down at Brian who is currently pretending to be a plush toy, unmoving as he is. Probably just using the Veil to his advantage and all, but you can totally work with this.
Picking him up by the nape of his neck, you give the woman that came for you a small little smile. You can talk more these days, but you're still not used to making any big expressions, okay? "This is Brian. He's a scientist."
You can hear something melting, which is a strange sound to be hearing at all. It also comes from, like, a dozen people all around you right now.
"… Would you like some tea to begin with? It's on the house," the waitress offers.
Heh. You still got it, your old charm is perfectly intact even after all this time in Elena's body.
Not sure that's quite it, daddy…
When Mitsuko arrives, it is to a you that is classily drinking your second cup of tea, this one being green tea after the black stuff was a bit too bitter for your tastes (you never really figured you'd need to adjust for that, not being a big tea-drinker before). However, as you are filled with the sentiments of solidarity and camraderie, you have not yet asked for any cake, even though that one waitress spent a couple minutes fussing over you halfway through your first cup.
Sure, that's mostly because you got free cookies to go with the tea, and they're good cookies, too. Checkered with dark and bright dough, they're sweet and just chewy enough to complement the tea. You're already very happy with this place.
…Note to self, consider stealing it somehow. As in, the building and the employees both. Or just, like, buy everything up so you can have free cookies and stuff whenever you want.
Priorities, amirite?
But now Mitsuko is finally in the building, her bright pink hair indicating to you this place might be her natural habitat. That or she's secretly a supervillain and this is her color-coded secret lair. Either/or.
As you are kind and compassionate and understanding, you do not point any of this out, however, and instead simply wave for her so she can find you.
"Finally!" The girl you've been waiting for says as she joins you, taking the words straight out of your mouth. "I am sorry I took so long, the traffic was murder today."
"I know that feeling," you nod as she takes a seat, immediately reminded of that one time some complete moron decided to park his car on the damn street so he could get fast food, keeping you from picking Elena up after school. He died later that same week, of course.
"And I assume this is Brian?" Mitsuko whispers, pointing at the plush cat-adjacent creature lounging next to your tea. "I thought you would be able to tell me where to find him, not bring him to meet me like this."
"Chuuh, unimportant," your Puchuu declares, swishing his tail. "My name is not well known, puchuh, so you knowing it is in itself strange. Why are you after me and who sent you, chuh?"
"Ah! I was supposed to give you something. One moment, please!" Stuffing one of her hands into a pocket in the dress she is wearing right now- not her magical girl uniform, for the record, meaning she's likely untransformed- she quickly pulls out-
An envelope. One she lays down on the table, letting you take a look at it.
Maybe you shouldn't be surprised, but on its back, which is what Brian skillfully flips upwards to take a look, you see a couple of weird symbols that vaguely make your brain cringe a little when you take them in, with only one single word written in plain English. That, of course, being what you suppose might be the name of the addressee of whatever is inside: 'Brian'.
It's in weirdly nice handwriting, too. Your own used to be more in the category of 'very drunk chicken scratch' back when you actually had to note things down by hand.
Once again Brian proves weirdly capable of fine manipulation with a pair of plush paws, but you can't exactly read anything as he opens the envelope in question and unfolds a few pieces of paper while quietly chanting 'chuh' under his breath. So instead you turn your attention towards Mitsuko, who has already waved over the waitress from earlier.
"So who wanted you to give this to him?" You ask, figuring you may as well get this conversation on the road already.
"Oh, it was my own… Puchuu, I think the English word is?" The pink-ette asserts. "She could not stay with me for very long, but she gave me this mission and some items to help me on the road. Her name is Kyubey?"
"CHUUUUH!" Oh, you know that sound, the one vaguely reminiscent of a boiling kettle. It's the sound of Brian getting agitated over something he can't do anything about. "She demands what?!"
"I had the impression she was… familiar with Mister Brian," the girl you're interrogating continues as though nothing had happened. "She called him 'baka' a lot."
You furrow your brow. "Is that Japanese? Because I don't know Japanese." Maybe you should look into learning some one of these days at this rate.
"PUCHUH!" Brian, meanwhile, doesn't seem to have calmed down. On the contrary, if anything. "She did what?!‽"
"Any bets this will be a major pain?" You ask.
"No betting or games of luck of any kind," Mitsuko chides you. "It is improper."
"Chuhackie!" Oh joy. Whenever your Puchuu butchers your name like that, it's… probably a bad sign. "Can we pack up and set up shop in some other city, chuh?"
"No," you reflexively answer, unwilling to let go of your turf just like that. "It's mine. I earned this city."
You did a lot of work to keep it from being destroyed, depopulated, set on fire or anything else of the sort, plus a bunch of your stuff is here that would be difficult to move. Especially your home, which is smack dab in the middle of the part of the Overcity corresponding to this place. You aren't running unless you really, really have to.
"Chuh P'chuh Chuuuuuuuuh!" Brian curses, teaching you a few new swear words in the process. "Fine, chuh! Pink Girl, you are under my command for the time being, puchuh, Jackie will contact you if we need anything. The higher ups decided we needed more local girls to deal with this city's particular status."
You tilt your head. What does that have to do with spontaneously leaving town?
"Puchuuh, we will be regularly inspected and audited from here on, too."
Ah. Yeah, that would do it, you suppose.
Sadly, while you would like to remain inside of this établissement and try out all the varieties of cake, cookies, biscuits and other examples of the great advancements humanity is capable of producing when given sufficient incentive (note to self, force humanity to advance baking sweet treats at gunpoint eventually), you cannot remain indefinitely- you actually do have some stuff to get done, after all.
Hence why both of you only eat two slices of cake each, strategically choosing different kinds so you can exchange a few bites of them on these little forks you're meant to use for cake. And, for the record, each bite is delicious.
Doubly so when you silently pressure Mitsuko into feeding you with her own fork by closing your eyes and opening your mouth at her. Of course you have to return the favor afterwards, but that's just common sense.
So, with the pink-haired girl now technically part of your team, you walk out of there after eating, the bill actually amounting to half the usual price for some reason as the waitress asks you to come back anytime. You made sure to pay yourself, of course- call it remaining instincts from when you were two whole Jackiemeters tall or the urge to make a point at Mitsuko, but you decided to use some of the loose change you still had lying around inside your little magical box.
…No idea where you took it from again, you probably found it in some dead people's pockets or something? Or maybe you picked some up from your treasure stash at some point.
Either way, you paid. That's what counts.
You're holding Mitsuko's hand when you leave the café, to make sure she doesn't get lost, and you're still doing so by the time you walk up to the meeting spot you asked the terrific trio (name subject to change) of magical girls that act as your minions to meet you at.
It's a good thing you were planning to introduce her to them anyways, though arguably now that she's part of your team in particular (her Puchuu apparently told Brian to get off his lazy ass and take care of her, something that ostensibly involves loads of extra paperwork) it is even more important you establish that all of you are on the same side.
That side being yours. Not love and justice, not humanity at large. You matter, the rest doesn't.
Of course that doesn't exactly stop the meeting you arranged from derailing before it even begins.
Moving into the park near the café you just met your newest teammate in, you know you've been spotted by the three figures when the particularly green-looking among them points at you with a blush on her face. "Ch-cheater!"
Specifically, she is pointing at the hand you're holding. "Muh."
Of course you clear the confusion up fairly quickly, mostly by way of 'pomf'ing Olivia on the head with the flat of your hand. "This is Mitsuko. She's like us."
"Ah!" Making a surprised sound, the girl you just forcefully calmed down bounces upwards, magic in her step; the only thing keeping her from shooting up into the air is your hand above her head. "You're-!"
"Hm," Mitsuko makes, pulling a notepad from somewhere as she scribbles something inside. "Magical delinquency, after all."
"Wha- that doesn't count! Why are you still on about that?!" The level of sheer, heart-broken indignity in her voice would give you pause- if, that is, you didn't regularly do worse to her. "I'm a magical girl! You know why I was busy at the beach now!"
"So much for not shouting who we are everywhere," you mutter, resisting the urge to sigh.
"You were still absent from school with no excuse. Hence, magical delinquency, rather than the non-magical kind," Mitsuko sniffs, tucking her notes away again. "The fundamental nature of the act did not change, little miss delinquent."
"Oh come ooon," Olivia whines, hanging her head as she kicks the ground. "That's not fair."
"As fun as the byplay is," Kerrie interrupts hear, clearing her throat, "would you mind introducing everyone? Seeing how you apparently know each other already."
"Ah, right! Mitsuko, this is Kerrie, a friend from school, and Bubbles, a… friend. They're both magical girls, too! And girls, this is Mitsuko, the transfer student I told you about already. Who is also a magical girl, apparently."
"Greetings," the pink-haired girl you brought along says with a slight bow. "My name is Mitsuko Yoshikawa, a fellow magical girl. Please take care of me."
"Uh-oh, she did the introduction bit," Bubbles immediately points out the obvious. "I'm, like, not an expert on authentic Japanese school girls, but I'mma call that one."
"Technically speaking, I never did go to school back home, but there were extenuating circumstances. Still, I am a Japanese girl and I attend school, contrary to some others," Mitsuko stares at Olivia at this, making her shrink into herself. "so I do believe the deduction is solid."
Slightly fed up with the glacial pace of the conversation- glacial things are your job, among other things, and you do not care for this particular speed of action being misused like this- you stomp a foot to complain about being ignored without having to say it. "Mitsuko was sent here to help me do stuff."
This, in turn, immediately seems to have Kerrie grow suspicious, or at least raises her hackles, a slight frown forming on her face as she keeps her arms crossed. "Huh."
You can't brook that kind of attitude, of course, so you look her straight in the eyes. "She won't burn half the city down."
…At least you hope she won't.
"That was one time," the one fire magical girl in the area complains, but relents nonetheless. "Fine. We should exchange some information so we know what to do if we all have to fight together, so-"
You immediately proceed to ignore her words, instead noticing how Olivia is still enviously staring at where you're once again holding Mitsuko's hand. Normally you'd just make fun of her or something, but…
Well, you've been trying to be nicer to Brian lately, and you figure you can at least give her some hope you'll treat her better too before you rip it from her again. So you sigh and use your free hand to grab hers, holding it as well.
She immediately smiles brightly enough to illuminate a standard light bulb. Such a puppy dog.
The part of introducing Mitsuko to the other local girls involving socializing with them is annoying and feels like a bit of a waste of your time, but you suppose you're the one and only one that is in a position to facilitate this kind of stuff.
…Ah crap, you just realized- you're being all responsible and shit. That's the one thing you promised your late wife to never do.
You were never married and my mother ran off as soon as I was born, Elena points out.
Except you hardly care about such minor details. Anyways, you maintain a facade of respectableness (is that a word?) as a matter of course, but you only wait around for so long before you drag Mitsuko off to 'complete the tour', as it were.
Olivia pouts when you let go of her hand. You are forced to deploy tactical head pats to make her go away.
Next off, you need to show the pink-haired girl joining your fold how to reach your home in the likely event of a local cataclysmic event you end up just sleeping through. Not that it happened so far, but you're basically expecting the city to be turned to rubble every time you go to sleep for any length of time at this point.
Or burned down in its entirety, anyways. Kerrie doesn't look the part, but you suspect she may or may not be a secret pyromaniac or something.
Fire magical girls. They're all insane and cannot be trusted.
But yeah, you explain to Mitsuko how to access the Overcity from the portal you most often use these days (only after clearing that up with Brian to ensure she won't be double-crossing you on orders of whoever sent her, but he claims she's probably legit), then demonstrate as much as you moonwalk into the Sprawl with style.
You practiced how to do so and it was absolutely worth the effort, anyone who claim otherwise is a lying liar who lies.
Naturally, the new addition to your forces is suitably awed as she takes in the splendour of your home and-
"This forest is beautiful… Magical lights grow in the trees?"
"They're fruit," you explain. "Tasty fruit. I'll show you in."
Oh yeah. Screw boring old celebrity homes, your magical home base is a megaton of more awesomeness concentrated into a singular point. Even though arguably the giant moving sand castle Yasmin and Tahira had…
Nah, your place is still cooler. Just because it has you inside of it. Too bad for those girls, but you're a great advantage in terms of home improvements, can't keep up with this.
And yes, you count as an AC and home defense in one, which means you factor into these kinds of things. Simple logic, that.
Mitsuko is suitably impressed by the facilities present inside your home, especially as you proceed to introduce her to some of the people living inside your base along with you; apparently, having a 'roommate' take care of some of the chores around the place is very 'college chic', according to her.
You don't pretend to understand what exactly she means, but she agrees that Chuckie is very neat to have on hand, which is good enough for you. You also show her around your backyard, where a certain land octopus has made it a point to use her black-and-white striped tentacles to climb trees every now and then before returning to the safe moisture of her pool.
Mitsuko and Minako quickly strike up a conversation in Japanese, which you just so happen to not speak so you don't really follow much of anything going on. That said, they do exchange numbers after a while (where did Minako even get a phone from?) and you move on.
Not at all because you got spooked by some suspiciously many-limbed shadows moving in the distance and decided to flee the scene just in case, despite Elena's laughter inside your head as she claims (obviously unrightfully) that you are mistaken.
Which is how and why you ended up down in the basement, where you were planning to use one of the training rooms Brian set up for you lately for some practice spellslinging, get your magical musculature limbered up and all that. You wanted to show Mitsuko around the place considering she's going to be working with you and all that, an initiative Brian surprisingly agreed with, so there you went.
She was amazed at first, but adopts a stern look when you get ready to do the thing, pulling out your weapons. "Jackie, I know that Americans love their guns, but I believe you are much too young to play with them yet."
Blasphemy. As a true, red-blooded 'Murican, you were practically born with an assault rifle in your hands and you learned to walk by using a shotgun as a crutch. Also, you're totally old enough to legally buy just about any ordinance you'd care to name, even if you don't look like it right now due to your magical girl-ification.
Still, all of that aside, there's a very good reason for what you are doing. "They're my weapons," you explain, showing the pink-haired girl you invited along your double guns as you switch them to water cutter mode. "See?"
You send twin streams of high-pressure water down the target range, hitting the roughly goblin-shaped target, the bullseyes drawn right on their center of mass. One even hits properly, the other one boring a hole through another target's head, which you consider a win as well.
"Mhm," Mitsuko makes, thinking. "Very well, these things do not give much choice. I shall assume your familiarity with guns may have influenced this, but then I did not wish for my Siegebreaker as my instrument of choice at the start, either."
"You didn't?" You ask, smoothly not mentioning that this caliber of guns was one of your preferred murder weapons when you didn't have the time or just didn't feel like getting particularly creative.
"Indeed," she nods. "I had assumed I would receive a wand or staff of some kind, the way these things are usually portrayed in anime and such. Of course now I am quite happy with what I have, I would not trade my beloved Siegebreaker for anything."
…Kinda chuuni how she named her weird giant spear-buzzsaw-forcefield thingy, but okay.
"Incidentally, would you mind if I used the, ah, facilities here as well?" Huh? Oh, does she need to take a- "I do believe some practice would do me good, as well. It is dreadfully rare for me to have the space and time to devote to honing my magical gifts."
…Right, that was totally what you were thinking.
You end up somewhat combining your practice with that of Mitsuko in the end, the other magical girl setting up semi-translucent, rainbow-colored magical barriers for you to target and, when possible, destroy. This is usually quite doable, as her magic isn't anywhere as strong as your own, though you suspect that has less to do with her relative inexperience and newb-ness and more with her distribution of personal strong points.
Mostly into the realm of 'smashing things in the face until face stops existing'. With the massive weapon she likes to twirl and swirl around when using her magic. To each their own, not like you're really any different with your gun and the massive icicles you shoot with them.
Which just so happens to be what you primarily use during your little practice session of firing at the barriers she creates for you. Sometimes Mitsuko gets tricky, giving you smaller targets, shaping them to better withstand the piercing impacts you subject them to and those kinds of things, which is mostly the reason you don't get one broken down per each shot you make, but by and large you can break through with a single lance well enough.
Honestly, just this much is already kind of impressive, you guess? Given how much you specialize in magically bombarding shit, just making you waste a moment to break those barriers of hers is not bad, especially as they're more supplementary for her than anything else.
More to the point, though, it seems Elena has decided to try supporting your efforts at self-improvement by way of 'encouraging' you. Oh daddy~, that one was so big and hard… Put it in deep, please!
Case in point. Of course that is exactly what you are doing- jamming your big, hard icicles deep into Mitsuko's barriers is the point of this exercise.
Ooh yes, push into her magic. Drill into her good!
That's a good idea, actually. You already give your ice lances a bit of a spin when you fire them off, but maybe giving them a little extra juice along with that would help, plus some drill bits towards the tip, to literally do as Elena says? You'll have to try it out and mess around a bit, you suppose.
"You are very engaged in our training," Mitsuko says, pulling you out of your contemplations on how to better penetrate all manner of monsters with huge-ass chunks of ice.
"I like shooting stuff," you nod.
"Well, I like mashing stuff, so I can sympathize," she returns it.
There's a reason you like her approach to this kind of life.
Before long, you tire of the whole training shtick of course, and move on to the next thing on your very much extensive and totally real list of things to do. That being a little visit to a certain place in the Overcity.
That's right baby, it's time to go do some magical shopping! It's not the boring old normal, mundane shopping that you just can't be arsed to do (and the day you understand why girls and women always have to take literal hours shopping for shoes is the day you cease being the manliest man to ever man the man-hood), for it involves magical currency being involved for magical stuff in magical shops.
Can't get much more magical than that.
Mitsuko, of course, has her own opinions. "Is it dangerous?"
"Eh, kinda?" You vaguely waggle a hand in a 'so-so' gesture. "Only if you're weak. Strong people don't rob each other there."
Now, the weak are, as always, fair game, which you figure is why the lower part of the place is so rife with crime and low-quality merchandise that technically qualifies as being magical and nothing more. Also why you frequently have your golems rampage around the place robbing people.
"I see," the pink-ette nods, arms crossed. "I shall accompany you for the sake of safety in numbers, then."
You tilt your head. How she arrived at that conclusion is kind of beyond you. "I'll be fine. Nobody messes with me."
Nobody that's lived to tell the tale, anyways. Same difference.
"Still, I am curious to see what kind off societies may form from magical folk intermingling. Only if you wouldn't mind, of course." Huh, is it just you or is she slowly, but noticeably getting smoother with her English?
Anyway, you just shrug. "Fine by me. Just make sure you don't get lost on the way. Keep close unless you want to spend a month wandering through the Sprawl before you find a way out."
Playing the guide through the obscure, complicated and in some ways intricate paths the Overcity's geology imposes on anyone that wants to get anywhere fast (or with any reasonable speed, anyways) goes well enough, though you don't quite like the way Mitsuko seems to be taking in the surroundings as you make your way through the area.
Then again, it's not like she could glean all that much from doing so. Like, half the signs the Sprawl positions to let those that can make them out navigate it require your magical sight to even see anyways, so there's little chance of her figuring anything big about them out to begin with.
For you are a highly advanced subspecies of Magical Girls far superior to any others, capable of perceiving magic in a way that remains beyond any of them. One could say that you are a Magical-er Girl, in fact.
But yes, you make it all the way to the city within the Overcity, the matryoshka doll of cities if you care to get into that. It's actually kind of interesting to know that the place can exist at all, what with this dimension' propensity to move around and shift every so often, but you suppose sufficient amounts of people living in the place may change how this stuff works.
Or maybe someone really strong just snapped their fingers and told the Sprawl to sit, which it then did. Like, you could totally do that if you wanted, for example, even if you've never done so before and won't do it unless you find out how to do it.
Emerging onto a balcony on a skyscraper overlooking the Overcity city, you wave a hand towards the place, not that it's hard to see from this vantage point. "There. I got business up in the spire, but you might want to explore the lower areas a bit."
"Whoah…" Eyes wide, Mitsuko steps up behind yourself, looking at the vista opening itself up before you. In the shine of a neon mist continually rising from the clustered high-rise buildings the city within the city stares back at you, innumerable lights and endless movement deep down on the ground showing that this place, for one, is more populated than most of the Overcity.
"Mhm," you make in vague agreement. "It's a lot less sci-fi in the central areas. Think more fantasy. Everything's stronger and more expensive, though, so start small."
"Will do! Ah, is there phone reception here? That way we can coordinate if anything happens or we want to go back," the pink girl suggests.
You… never really checked for that, did you? Pulling out your phone, you give her a nod. "Got it. If there's anything, just write me. Might not have reception where I'm going, but I'll follow up if you're in trouble."
You're a generous and helpful senpai, after all.
Leaving Mitsuko behind in the lower parts of the settlement you've taken to visiting as your main connection to the greater magical community at large, you quickly move towards the higher areas just like you told her, using one of your ice platforms to get there. Aerial traffic isn't too common in the outer areas, but the closer you move to the spire the more you have to dodge and weave through it.
Lucky you there don't seem to be any traffic rules beyond 'everyone try not to have any accidents, yeah?' in place. If someone can manage magical flight of one sort or another, you suppose it's generally assumed they can steer well enough not to smack into things.
Or else they better had be powerful enough to survive annoyed things smacking them out of the air in turn. One asshole on a hover-bike looking thing nearly drives straight into you until you quickly summon a massive ice lance aimed at him, for example, in response to which he does use the fucking brake rather than risk it.
People are stupid, but not that stupid. Most recognize that they probably don't want to pick a fight with someone that potentially can and will murder them over nothing of importance.
Soon enough you get walking, knowing approximately where to find Baphomet's Library already and easily recognizing the constant lava waterfalls as you finally hit the right street. Look, you don't have great memory, sometimes you just have to invest a little extra time into figuring out where stuff was, okay?
Anyways, you enter the big brimstone double doors with your usual panache, unconcerned with anything but the knowledge and stuff you can find inside. Baphomet isn't near the entrance today, but-
"My, my, my, look at who who's come around," a sultry goat-y demon girl voice says behind you (where there was nothing only moments ago), a pair of slender hands grabbing you below your armpits and lifting you in the air so you can't turn around. "I'd almost think you were shy if I didn't know better."
"… Hey," you weakly greet the owner of the place, lamely flopping an arm at nothing in particular. "Can I get down?"
"Nnhn, no, I don't think so," Baphomet says, merrily carrying you deeper into her library. "I figure you owe me a session of catch-up homework before I let you go again."
Not homework, anything but that! Spending all day at school only to do your actual learning at home because the America education system is a joke is a surefire way to get nothing else done!
Mitsuko was, well, not exactly used to being exposed to new and exciting environments, having spent most of her life after a certain point inside a mostly sterile hospital room when she… When things happened, but she was not exactly opposed to the experience. If anything, she quite enjoyed taking in the people, the buildings, the constructions and objects and the odd creatures here and there as well.
Magical communities like this one were eclectic and unusual by definition, she supposed, but this one had to be particularly interesting, if by its sheer size alone. Every new passerby had their own story, their own way they found magic and a way into this place, their own story to tell, and this time she was not reduced to reading about them second-handedly on the day she had the strength left to hold a book.
But this was her mind and they did not speak about cancer here, so out with those thoughts, she had a city to explore! The cyberpunk aesthetic was interesting, if nothing else, though she did believe everyone could do without the trash piling up in every second alleyway she passed.
Then again, who took away the trash in a place like this? Were magical garbage collectors at work? Did trash simply discorporate on its own in this magical dimension? Maybe it fused into the ground to produce more buildings with its mass?
Questions over questions, and only her imagination to answer them. Well, she could ask Jackie, too, but where was the fun in that?
Sure, this seemed like the kind of place her dear father and mother would throw a fit over existing, not to mention Mitsuko being present inside of it, all the futuristic flair aside, but not many things could truly worry her these days. So she simply proceeded through these magical slums, the obvious being obvious regardless of how much magic and what strange other dimensions were involved, and-
"'Ey sweetie, wanna make a quick buck?"
Mitsuko blinked, mildly surprised. Nobody had called out to her so far, so this was quite a surprise.
"Jus' gotta get yer mouth busy a lil', yeah?"
"Jeff, Jeff what the fuck are you doing?"
"Fffuck off, she's mine ya hear me?"
She cleared her throat, summoning her Siegebreaker with an elegant wave of her hand that had it lie nicely in her grasp. "Oh, please do not mind me," she said, raising her weapon up above her head. "I will take only a moment."
A swift vertical bisection that had the alley covered in gore later, Mitsuko proceed right onwards, smiling happily. Big cities like this really did have anything and everything a girl could wish for.
It takes a little bit of work, but by virtue of being super smart (and solving a puzzle or two that Baphomet demands you solve before she lets go of you) you soon regain your freedom of movement and are allowed to research your own subjects of interest once more, though the library's owner has to leave you alone for the moment.
Something something plundering the knowledge of dead gods, you didn't really pay attention to the books she was holding onto. You were already busy trying to remember the instructions on how to find the books you are looking for she left you with.
Now, while you aren't a smarty-pants Brain McBrainington, you do know how to handle some books- you did go to university, way back when, before circumstances happened and you never did quite get to become the murderous accountant you thought you were meant to be at the time. Things turned out pretty fine for you with the IT job you ended up working so you can't really complain, though.
Point is, you may be out of practice, but reading through a few books to figure out the actually important bits is not so far out of your wheelhouse you can't do it at all. Even though it's gonna be super boring and a pain in the ass.
…You are way out of practice admittedly, yes, but spending an hour or two browsing won't be too bad, you think.
The biggest issue with such a massive collection of books as Baphomet's Library, you quickly find, is not so much finding ones that pertain to your inquiry as it is finding the right ones that do amongst the ones available. You quickly glance through and discard no less than three logs of inhuman and pointless experimentation, a dozen lists of deported undesirables that got thrown out of somewhere for growing monster parts, one detailed instruction booklet on how to turn squid girls into tasty seafood dishes and a couple of reports on examples of monster-ified humans before you find what you want.
'A Complete Guide To Caring For Your Aquarium-Bound Daughter', 'Why Tentacles' and, of course, 'Monstrous Descendants: The Encyclopedia'. Not necessarily the perfect sources of information, maybe, but something to work with, at least.
To summarize what you can find out, you can confirm that sometimes monsters mating with humans will produce seemingly human offspring, especially if the monster in question possesses human-like or -adjacent properties to begin with, only for them to later exhibit their non-human parentage. In rarer cases, monstrous genetics can lay dormant for a generation or two, which apparently causes no end of trouble on occasion.
Conversely, completely inhuman monsters reproducing with humans may sometimes have similarly monstrous offspring that possesses human or near-human intelligence if this is otherwise unusual for their species, but that's apparently classified as something completely different. You'd have to read yourself into the science there to find out more, but for now you have something else to look into.
Specifically in the case of squid-girls like Minako, nutritional requirements are apparently somewhere between that of a squid and a normal human, with both needing to be satisfied to be sure she's doing well. Meaning, she needs both lot of seafood, from fish to other squids, and also lots of sweets, particularly chocolate, to live.
You can sympathize, you are also dependent on chocolate to maintain your health and fitness.
Now, as for other stuff, while Minako should be able to subist off of just a bunch of raw fish, she's obviously gonna enjoy it more if it's prepared, and there's no real issues to her eating normal food, assuming she doesn't have any particularly notable allergies or shit like that that may have made it through her transformation. You should probably ask her about that kind of stuff later.
Salt water is gonna be good for her skin and make it easier for her to stay on land for longer at a time, but she should be able to make do with normal water otherwise, just like Brian mentioned. She may have issues controlling her tentacles, yup, you also saw that in action already, practice may alleviate the issue but she physically has additional brains now at the base of her tentacles, so the issue may persist indefinitely depending on how stubborn those are.
Good news, she should be able to withstand even extensive head trauma as long as her extra brains are intact, as they can in theory let her just keep going with her skull caved in. Potentially even regenerate the damage, as she may have slow, but steady regeneration going as long as she is well-fed and submerged in water.
Useful to know, actually. Might help deal with scrapes and bruises in general, too.
Resistance to low temperatures, resistance to higher temperatures too, though not as extensive, ability to withstand great pressure and generally increased physical strength… Oh, depending on her exact species, she might have some additional magical powers, too.
If she's lucky, Minako might be able to use some water magic, or stuff in that direction. Or she could have, like, stealth magic and shit. It's hard to say how her magical abilities may manifest as abilities in that direction, if at all, until and unless they happen to just get used on accident or something.
Otherwise, feeding her well and regularly breeding her should do the most important parts of her healthcare. Apparently the one guy whose daughter turned all squid-y ended up spawning a bunch of monster squid and jellyfishes after he 'accidentally' knocked her up- it's not guaranteed she'll give birth to human-like offspring, you suppose.
Still, a lot of info you're getting here. Of course-
"Finally done. Now, where were we?" Ah. Baphomet's back. "Why don't we see about testing how good of a girl you have been?"
"Muh." This may get real complicated real fast at this rate.
The city was really quite fun to explore, but like anyone else Mitsuko could grow exhausted after a while; like any good thing, new discoveries and sights were best had in moderation, after all. Hence why she was, consequently, having a moment of rest.
There were some simple locales to be found around this so-called Overcity city that would commonly have customers sit inside and eat, simple streetside restaurants where there was space for them and street stalls where there was not. She was somewhat interested in what kinds of food were available in such a magical place inside a dystopian cyberpunk place, so naturally she chose to investigate.
Of course there was the issue of currency to consider as well. She had noticed as she explored, but most transactions in this place seemed to involve one sort of coin or another, specifically deep orange disks of metal that were quite ubiquitous in the hands of any that wished to make a purchase of some kind.
She did not have any of those. However, they were merely the most common form of payment, rather than the only; more mundane currencies were not too out of place in some establishments either, from what Mitsuko had been able to pick up.
So she had that covered, if nothing else. Her dear papa was a worrywart, she hardly needed thousands of dollars for pocket money, but if the locals would take dollars, she would hardly complain about having too many of them.
Also, the proprietor of one of the localities near the place where she put that one evildoer to the sword- his name had been… John, Jack, something with J, she was sure- had recognized her and offered her a free meal for taking care of him. He had been a known quantity in these parts, it seemed.
Something about magic that mentally affected others? She had shrugged off the crudeness and simply moved to eliminate him on pure instinct, but it was good to know she was right in doing so.
Either way Mitsuko had insisted on paying still, but as she had a seat at the counter of the surprisingly homey café that reflected, yet also rejected the style of the city around it, she got into a conversation with the woman that cooked the place's food.
The curry was delicious, for the record. 9/10, not perfect but quite good all the same. She would come back for more if the opportunity arose. Also, the drinks were nice, with the little umbrellas and lots of sugar inside of them, apparently brands of soft drinks that had been imported from several parallel dimensions.
Nuka Cola was an… interesting name, but so was Nyarlepsi.
But all of the culinary experiences to be enjoyed aside, she even met new people just by hanging around and eating! Most of the Curry Café's patrons were rather private and withdrawn, simply not all that interested in casual chatting, but every now and then Mitsuko could snag a conversation partner that didn't mind talking a little.
A lot of people just needed an open ear to start talking, she figured, and that open ear may as well be her. Not like she had anything better to do while wolfing down her third bowl of delicious chicken curry- the servings were rather plentiful as well, which was just another plus for the restaurant, for the record.
One of those people was a man that wore an all-black full body bodysuit, head covered by a large helmet of the same color. "No luck again?" The cook, waitress and owner of the Curry Café asked as he came in and approached the same counter she was sitting at.
"None," he sighed, taking a seat. "Like they disappeared into thin air. Ah, and the same as usual, please."
Mitsuko just gave the woman quickly cooking up some ramen (the good kind too, she'd already given it a try and the soup stock was amazing, not that she'd had much time to try proper ramen before she had to leave Japan following her release from the hospital) a quizzical look. She was aware what it meant by this point.
"Ah, this is Justice Ranger Black. He's, how do I say this…"
"I am- or rather, was… part of a group," the man explained of his own volition. "We were a whole team and all, small-time superheroes, know what I mean?"
"I absolutely do," Mitsuko nodded, faintly remembering her childhood, cheering on the people with the combining giant robots defeating the bad guys. "The other members disappeared?"
"Yeah. We didn't always stay stuck together, but they'd have called for me if they were confronting anyone really dangerous. We mostly just patrolled the slums, help the needy a little where we could, defeat any evildoers that tried to oppress those around them, that kind of thing." The bona-fide sentai elite sighed again. "Nobody can or will tell me what happened to them. Just business as usual one day, then, wham, they're all gone just like that."
"That sucks," she readily agreed, pausing her eating for a moment. "For what it's worth, I hope you find your friends, or at least find out what happened to them."
"Thanks. Most people I talk to just assume they're dead or ran off to get a life, but it's nice to hear you say that," Justice Ranger Black chuckled self-depreciatingly.
Both of them were quiet until his ramen was ready, the bowl deposited in front of him. "Cheer up Blackie, that's the best you can do in a situation like that," the owner told him, patting his helmet. "Even when all hope's lost, you can at still say 'screw it' and keep going with what they would've wanted, right?"
Honestly, Mitsuko could dig that. It was the only thing that'd kept her sane in that hospital ward. "Yeah, yeah! Never give up, even if you should. The only way life really gets you down is if you stop fighting it!"
Black chuckled again, but it was a little better than before already.
Extricating yourself from Baphomet's 'care' takes a bit of doing, as the library's owner is as always very eager to impress upon you the need for learning at large, but you know for a fact that, despite what some may think, basic arithmetic and literacy are all you really need to do most office jobs out there. Heck, you know it from experience, it's not like you had any expertise on IT and you were still the IT guy in the place you used to work at.
The only reason anyone really goes to university these days is to get a degree, basically a piece of paper to wave at prospective employers in the hopes that it's enough to get your foot in the door. It's just a way to make people spend time and money on stuff before they're 'allowed' into the ranks of those that can almost pay for their own rent and food.
But hey, not your problem. What got you your elevated pay in the end was a bit of acting, a couple of connections within the company (actually, what did end up happening to Frank?) and taking the one guy that was giving you the stink-eye when promotion time came around out behind the back of the barn.
In the terminal sense, of course. In your defense, the dude pulled a knife on you first, not your fault you were just armed better as a matter of course.
And nowadays you can just ignore any such mortal foibles, for you don't have to pay rent, your utilities are taken care of by the environment and you did get Brian to establish an internet connection you do, similarly, not need to pay for. It's just objectively superior to be a magical girl with a secret home base inside a twisted alternate city-dimension than to have to deal with any of that shit.
And that's without even the suburban prospect of Home Owners' Associations. You actually considered moving out of the big apartment you used to live in at some point when Elena was old enough to start school, but the sheer oppressive douche-baggery of what amounts to a collective of shitbags getting up in each others' business like teenagers in a zombie movie had you stay well clear of any of that shit.
You still murdered the worst offenders among them you could figure out half a year later in an 'accidental' house fire of course (turns out the exact shade of paint the HOS in question insisted on was surprisingly flammable), but that's neither here nor there.
But yeah, to return to the issues you face in the present, you end up having to write up a short essay on the basics of ice magic and its uses. Luckily, you have more than enough material to refer to thanks to personal experience, and Baphomet doesn't really demand a particularly high bar as to the formal aspects of your work.
Also, the accompanying handjob as she makes you sit on her lap so she can watch what you do again doesn't go amiss either.
So you get that done (though your hand cramps up a bit 'cause you're so unused to writing by hand, you can regenerate that away pretty easily), leave and collect Mitsuko, before you forget and accidentally strand her in the Overcity. That would be a pretty awkward thing to do as a team lead, after all.
Sadly, once you're back at your home, it turns out the pink-haired magical girl has to be back at her place by evening, which means she's technically already running late, and you have to show her the way back to normal reality (as opposed to whatever reality the Overcity is inside of). Kind of a bummer- you wanted to hang out and potentially molest her a bit- but you suppose it is what it is.
At least she had fun and tells you she's up for having fun again anytime you want before she leaves. Which is great in itself, someone has to acknowledge the pleasure of your acquaintance and everyone else is too selfish and self-absorbed to realize that the only importance their existence can hope to garner is found in your opinion of them.
There was a lot of work to do and it was impossible to tell how much time there was left to do it in so the entity that was apparently known as Brian of late wasted none of the latter while getting started on the former. Having some experience with the business of high-level audits- because some 'people' had to get up in its business all the time- it wouldn't be too hard to ensure the home base of its most recent endeavors would not come under fire, at least.
And for the record, it had never been indicted of any factual wrongdoing, for despite what some do-gooders may like to think the ethical standards imposed upon it were not only laughable, they were also easily circumvented at every turn.
In retrospect that may have been one reason (among many) so many of the entity's co-workers disliked it, but if the management truly had an issue with it harvesting the souls, bodies, minds and ardor of various beings, innocent or otherwise, the rules would have simply been amended towards this end.
No, if it could worm its way into recycling braindead magical girls, that was obviously an intended use of resources. Admittedly, now that it was forced to make do with more terrestrial and base resources than it used to, it had immediately begun to cut corners and ignore those restrictions that did not strictly apply to it anymore, then swiftly encroached on those that did.
Which could be coming back to bite it, but that bridge, as the quaint little mortals said, would be crossed when it got to it.
For now it just had to ensure that nothing actually incriminating could be found within the improvised laboratory it had set up. To this end, it had already dimensionally shunted a third of its current projects, then proceeded to… 'freshen up' the rest a little, when it could not simply pretend its main subject was responsible for them.
After all, Jacqueline Frost was possessed of great resourcefulness and not technically bound by the tenuous rulings still applying to its current position.
A convenient scapegoat, particularly as it allowed a greater degree of freedom without any additional punishments nor increased… difficulty. Of course the exact shape of the audit meant to take place against them remained unknown, but based on historical data and the entity's own knowledge on how these things were run, it seemed most likely that the auditor would be either the Faceless or the Collector.
…Both would be an issue and required careful handling, but it was not as though they would be insurmountable. The question was merely one of what risks would be taken when counteracting the audit and what strategy was best employed to do so.
Great violence would likely be employed either way. The capacity for combating great threats was, after all, a valued and central part of any operations involving modern magical girls, and so such things were also included in the evaluations that audits ultimately were.
In other words, defeating the auditor in question, or at least demonstrating the level of power required for them to back off, was a legitimate way to complete an audit early. A reflection of the fact that sufficient might 'made right' in society, to borrow another proverb.
Not how 'Brian' would have chosen to structure these things, but then, his opinion was rarely accounted for so what did he care?
All of this still left one last obstacle to audit-proofing the Main Subject's base of operations, however. "Chuuh, you must go into hiding temporarily for an unspecified amount of time, as I said."
"Muh? Muh muh muh muh muh!"
"Puchuh, just… Imagine an enemy approaches and-"
""Muh muh muh muh muh muh muh muh muh muh muh muh muh muh muh muh muh muh muh muh muh muh muh muh muh!""
"Chuh, do not fight them!" 'Brian' produced the sound waves to express the gratingly inefficient information medium that was words. "You must hide and ambush them when they least expect it, chuuh, hence why you must hide first!"
"…Muh muh?"
"…Puchuh, I shall supply you with additional chocolate if that is what it takes, yes."
Surely Jackie had some hidden storage of the stuff around the place Brian could make off with for this purpose. Any good cause demanded sacrifice.
You wake up with a bad feeling in the back of your head, for some reason, something that hasn't really happened often since you went magical girl. Normally, your head may be muddled and you may feel sleep-drunken in the mornings, but your regeneration at the very least does prevent you from having headaches and similar after getting up in the mornings.
You occasionally used to have some issues with low blood pressure, which meant you needed that extra coffee in the morning to get yourself going. And some extra sugar never hurt in that situation, either.
Incidentally, that was the reason your hands were just pretty cold to the touch sometimes. Back when your natural body temperature wasn't 'as deep as you can go', which is obviously the superior option.
Anyways, you slowly blunder your way downstairs, both waiting for your mind to straighten itself out again and requiring sustenance, which you vaguely associate with the kitchen. Unsurprisingly, that is where you find yourself, after what may or may not be half an hour of confused attempts to find where the stairs went.
They are very shady and can hide from observation. In no way are you just too muddle-headed in the mornings. Your mind is clear and sharp like a sword made of ice at all times. Failure to accept this is heresy and shall be punished with public rape correction or flogging, depending on individual fuckability.
Punishment must fit the crime, after all. Which is worse and what this says about the regime of Applied Jackietology is in the eye of the beholder, though, you suppose.
Still, once you've figured out how to kitchen, all you have to do is find Chuckie and-
"Good morning, Jackie!"
You grumble with a mild note of incoherent-ness.
"Say, did you eat any of the chocolate fruits I stored in those crates? Because all of them are gone and for the life of me I have no idea where they went."
You look at her. You look outside the house through the glass door that leads into your backyard. You see the open, emptied and outright missing wooden storage containers you did not, in fact, plunder yet.
The following temper tantrum covers the kitchen in twenty inches of ice in all directions. Chuckie makes you clean it all up afterwards, but you were totally justified and in the right there.
You have a lot of things to do, among those being the now urgent need to patrol your territory for the abominable chocolate thief or thieves, that you may bring upon them their righteous punishment with all due consideration and haste. Meaning, extract the chocolate from their bodies if you have to.
You were looking forward to burying your face in all the harvested chocolate fruit, goddammit! Your plans for bathing yourself in chocolate milk have once again been foiled, and, worse, you know not whoever the perpetrators offending you so may be!
This infuriates you. Granted, you can only maintain that level of emotional energy for so long, but that doesn't stop that for all of twenty minutes, you're actually really personally offended and invested in this case, before your hunger catches up with you and you have to return to ask Chuckie for food.
Thankfully she's already made toasted fruit slices by then, so that's taken care of, at least.
Speaking of fruit, though, you take some time out of your extremely busy post-breakfast bliss to go take a look at that small grove of 'brain fruit' that has been growing in a particular spot inside your garden ever since you gave Viridis those leftover bits of brain juice. Incidentally, you have no idea how said brain juice was made originally, but that didn't exactly stop you from assuming Viridis would be able to do something with it.
And indeed, thanks to Chuckie regularly watering them, a handful of delicate stalks have been growing out of the ground in a particularly fertile patch of forest lit up by a mix of bright fruits and a spotlight the Overcity grew on a nearby high-rise building shining down at an angle.
You have to say, the stuff growing out of that is indeed suitably… brain-like, yeah. It does fit the description of a brain fruit.
"Sure looks brainy," you say, crouching down to give the plant created by your actions a gentle poke. The moment you do, however, you feel a strong sense of vertigo, making you shake your head as you get up again.
This was distinctly attack-like, just now. Your brow furrows.
"Who just punched me in the brain?" You demand to know, ready to tear the attacker to shreds. Or bend them over and sodomize them until they feel appropriately, anyway.
Always so aggressive, a voice inside your mind lights up. You blink. Maybe you should try to be less so, and instead find your inner zen?
Screw that, you don't tell mysterious voices telling you to chill out how to do their thing, they better not tell you how to do yours. You're plenty chill already.
Ah, yes. Puns. About your magic. As though your character was not one-dimensional enough already.
Okay, now that's just rude. Time to obliterate whoever or whatever this is.
Yeah, show 'em who's boss, daddy! I'm the only one allowed to lounge in this mind, bitches!
Please, there is no need for any unpleasant business. We are all perfectly rational beings, are we not? And if your intelligence has yet to catch up with the situation still, perhaps you should look down.
You do so, blankly staring at the brain fruit.
Greetings, oh strange and unreasoning aspect of our creation, the plant in the approximate shape of a brain beams into your head. I would shake your hand, but unfortunately I am fresh out of such digits myself. I trust 'punching your brain' shall suffice as a substitute.
You roll your eyes. Great, so the plants you were planning to press into more brain-y juices, what, developed sapience and telepathic abilities? Just great, now even the vegetables are getting cheeky with you.
That was not my intent, but speaking of such, you did recover remarkably well from a gentle nudge that would have taken comparatively greater intellects far longer to. Congratulations on your mental… robustness, shall we say.
Damn sassy for someone whose brain is just a quick punch away from-
Aaand you're all dizzy again. Ugh, screw these guys.
Repositioning to a somewhat safe distance from the brain literally growing from a stem in the ground, you clear your throat. "I made you to harvest more brain juice."
Ah, yes, we know. This information is hardly hidden, the rude plant-based intelligence you inadvertently created by throwing stuff you don't understand at the next best thing to a god you've seen as of yet replies. Catch.
Before you can react, a stream of clear, kinda purplish liquid spurts out of the thing you were conversing with. Straight at your face, that is, your eyes screwing shut just in time.
Oh yes, it unconvincingly moans into your mind, completely calm and direct as it has been for as long as you've known it. As in, for this entire talk you've been having. I am squirting all over you, 'mommy'. Or would you prefer 'daddy'?
I'm the only one allowed to use that word! Elena, predictably, complains.
"I'll just ask Chuckie to bring a jar next time," you grumble, casually freezing the stuff that was just shot at you over to more easily wipe it off your face in little chunks and shards. Then you point at the brain fruit. "And you keep your lip to yourself. Piss me off and I'll just nuke this area to the next ice age next time."
We shall cogitate on the secrets of the universe, past, present, future and your petty grievances in peace, then. Perhaps we shall understand the infinity of human stupidity a little better next time we converse.
See, now they're getting it. People are stupid, everyone should just do what you say and everything would work much better just like that.
Back inside your home, safe from any uppity plant life that suffers from misconceptions regarding its intelligence and importance relative to yourself, not to mention the mistaken impression that its brain-punches can work on your very swole brain matter, you proceed onward to see Brian about your cut from the magic juice production you've got going on.
Like, you don't have to deal with transportation, which is nice, but you still did invest into this operation, the least you can expect is the continued payoff. And hey, the people living in the district in question have finally gotten the memo- there's a decent, consistent flow of magical essence you can siphon off of their activities these days.
Of course that only means you have some other issue that will take some resolving at some point. "Puchuh, remember when I mentioned that us using the demonic lust field as fuel for our own ends is technically very irregular?"
You look at Brian, having already pocketed your magical essence payment and tilting your head. "This about the audit?"
"Indeed, chuh. We cannot easily move the machinery in question, its location relative to the field lets it run and it was never designed to be relocated, puchuuh, so we will have to either hide or defend it when the time comes. Chuhst letting you know in advance."
You cross your arms. "That's stupid. Audits are stupid." Mostly in the sense that that sounds like a lot more effort than you'd like to invest into what has been a more or less steady, smooth stream of revenue for you so far.
"Chuuh, I fully agree for once. We should-"
Just then, Elena's ice golem form enters the room, carrying- "Hey daddy, look what I found near the house!"
You do not scream. Nor do you run away in a sudden panic, despite the sudden, inexplicable and abjectly objectionable presence of a sp*der in the same room as you. Yes, it is dead and Elena is waving its legs around at your direction, but neither does this cause you to reflexively open fire with both of your guns, damaging a couple of walls in the process.
The entire affair is completely calm, rational and does not, in fact, involve you screaming a little more as you flee and demand that the thing be thrown into the magical furnace two rooms over to be turned into a less horrible form. Even so, you vow not to let Elena out for at least a couple of hours, for her behavior, while not being horrible and panic-inducing, still could use some improvement.
Also, she really should stop bullying you like this.
Minako, the tentacled, indefinite houseguest you fished from the ocean (your dick being the figurative fishing rod here), has been settling into her new circumstances well enough so far, making an effort to get to know and get along with other residents of your garden where her dependency on staying wet at all times allows it.
She climbs on land for tea parties with Chuckie, Mirasol and Elena (if she is summoned into a golem body at the time), she plays with the grasswolves by throwing several sticks out at once using her bulky, yet still deft and skillful tentacles for them to fetch and she even hops and creeps amongst the tree branches up above the forest floor, both to grab extra food in the form of the luminous fruits ubiquitous among what amounts to your backyard lot and to play with the small animals that can be found up there.
The spinies, as you named them, don't sting tentacles for some reason, and instead are somehow friendly towards them, the terrestrial aphrodisiac-envenomed sea urchins slowly creeping along to sit on them. How or why this happens is entirely beyond you, but you'll prophylactically blame magical girl tentacle porn just in case. That seems like it would be on point, anyways.
It's called Hentai normally, it's a specific genre of a genre and it deserves to be recognized as such.
Exactly your point. Anyways, Minako has a lot to do in those times she can pull herself out of her mildly salted water, yet even so there is one person in your garden she has yet to meet. Though whether calling her a 'person' a such is accurate or not is another question entirely, given Viridis is less a singular entity and more a magical phenomenon given form and consciousness by its own will.
Spirit deity things are weird sometimes. It's not like that ever stopped you from trying to fuck them, so maybe you shouldn't talk.
So there you are, carrying Minako in one of those warm ice bowls you've made a point to use to ferry her around- a now tried and true method of handling squid girls, with a rich and varied history beginning with that first encounter you had with her at the beach.
"Not to be rude," she says as you walk into the woods, her upper body poking out of the water that fills up her bowl, "but what is so important about this person we are meeting?"
Mirasol, who is naturally also along for the ride, sitting on the edge of the warm ice construct you're moving along with nothing but the power of your mind, cackles like the monkey she is, her long plant-hair drifting down below like seaweed. "Oh, she's just my mother," she tells the Japanese girl. "You know, my not-Jackie one. She made the forest 'round here, too."
"Ah." Minako fidgets a little before she asks her next question. "Is this about when Jackie and me had… s-sex? Because I do not wish to be a homewrecker and-"
"Hah!" Yeah, you gotta agree there, that was funny. "Nah, mom's just fine with that. I'm guessing mini-mom here wants to take you to see her to let her work her magic."
"What magic in particular?"
"Well, she can do a couple things, but if I had to guess it's probably-"
The languid, catty form of Viridis snakes its way out of the trees surrounding you on all sides right in front of you, walking up to your little group with little fanfare. "Oh my, did my little stud impregnate another girl? Good work."
You could listen to that purr for hours on end.
"Eh?" Minako, for her part, sounds somewhat confused. "EH?!"
"Hey, just means you can get it over with quick. Some people really have to work to get themselves knocked up," Mirasol advises her.
"I am much too young to be a mother!" Blushing brightly, the squid girl has both hands on her cheeks, looking entirely overwhelmed.
You resist the urge to muh.
Of course Minako does require somewhat of an explanation as to what exactly Viridis does, though the one she receives is, while factually correct, not necessarily easy to understand.
"I am life. If you need to, you may refer to me as 'Viridis'."
"Nice to meet you, Viridis. My name is Minako. What would you mean when you say that you are 'life'?"
Viridis just gestures for the overgrown garden whose lawn you never did get around to mowing. "I am everything that grows."
You shrug as you insert yourself into the conversation, Mirasol too busy holding back her giggles in the background to do any explaining herself. "Viridis is Viridis," you sum the situation up in three coherent words. Simple as that. "Brought you here to ask her to help you."
"Why do you- ah." Minako is a smort squid, she just needs a moment to figure out what you mean. "Viridis, would you be able to give me legs again? I, ah, I used to have those before my heritage apparently awakened, and I miss being able to stay on land for longer than twenty minutes at a time."
The cat-spirit-goddess isn't exactly given a full picture here, but you doubt she particularly needs it. Given the feats of magical genetic engineering you've seen her perform without breaking a sweat, you're pretty sure she can tell as much just by looking at Minako.
That's not to say she's some sort of scientist- that job is already taken up by Brian, for one. No, Viridis just does what's in her nature, and that is to be nature. Except nature is one cold, ambivalent bitch that just make things evolve by letting them mutate and sort out what has the most offspring by itself, rinse and repeat until whatever work best stays in the population.
Or, in this case, skip all of that and just put together entire ecosystems one piece at a time with no regard for what they do or how they spread. Which suits you just fine, to be fair. But yes, you figured if there was anyone that could just let Minako stay on dry land under her own power again, it would be her.
The only question is if you're correct in your assumptions up to this point, and whether or not she's willing to help someone unrelated to herself out like that.
"I suppose something could be done…" Peering closely at Minako, Viridis proceeds to stretch her back, her rolling breasts looking even bigger and juicier in that pose than they normally do already. "But only if she were to keep herself pregnant. A dozen eggs like this would give her a day or two…?"
Ah, there's the catch, you suppose. She'd have to 'use up' her pregnancy to fuel it. Meaning you would have to keep impregnating her to let her stay out of the water reliably.
How terrible. Utterly impossible to bear for anyone that isn't you.
"Uhm… When you say 'a dozen eggs', do you mean I would be laying…?" Ah, right. The perils of being a squid girl, you guess.
Viridis just gives her a confused look. "Of course. That is what your species does." Right, she probably doesn't understand some people don't immediately understand how their own biology works. That's just her being her.
"…Would they be, ah, human? Or like me? Or would they be…" Minako whispers the last word, one of her tentacles raised so she can hug it to her chest for comfort while she holds onto its tip. "Squids?"
"Not human," the green cat lady denies. "They could inherit your traits, but that is unlikely without intervention. This batch is all non-human in its entirety."
So, squids.
"Jackie!" She calls for you, eyes wide. Ah crap, you think she may be hyperventilating "I do not want to give birth to squids!"
The video game you've been playing in your off time, Bloodborne of Bleedbirth or something (you're gaming right now, not thinking), is as appreciably fun to play as ever. Enemies are dangerous enough to be worth dodging around each and every one of their attacks and yet still die nice and fast, especially since you're making damn sure to keep your damage as high as the game lets you.
It's all a matter of knowing your moveset and when to attack, really. Step one, never get hit, dodging is made nice and easy for a reason. Step two, punish any attempts at hitting you with horrible damage. Step three, you win. Simple enough.
And really, any game that lets you shoot big-ass monsters in the face and then ram your hand into their soft tissues for massive damage has to be doing one thing right at minimum. Fisting your enemies' hearts is an art in and of itself, as you have decided recently.
At the moment, you're messing around inside this Forbidden Forest area, having made your way into some kind of perverse caricature of a windmill, looted a bunch of stuff (including a literal cannon for personal use, though it eats through your ammo like mad so you didn't switch it in as your main offhand weapon so far) and executed some weird beggar guy because you didn't like his tone (and also the fact he was obviously eating corpses) to the cheers and adulations of your chat slaves, when you suddenly receive a message over the PlayStriker network.
Thankfully, Elena is there, and you also already have a headset lying around she brought back from her own looting expeditions into the Overcity, so you are perfectly equipped to deal with the friend request and subsequent voice chat initiation from Crimson Kat.
Who, very obviously, is Crimson from Kitten's Kat Café. Why she chose to make her streamer name her literal name with an added hint of where she works is a mystery to you, but hey, she do her and all that.
"Hey Jackie, you didn't tell me you were a streamer, too!" She greets you, smiling widely in the picture of her own stream Elena helped you put into the corner of your screen. You chalk it up to some strange techno-wizardry, you never were good with any of this stuff yourself. "Wanna game together?"
"Sure. Just don't drag me down."
A bit of fiddling with passwords and paying a point of Insight to ring a bell that lets you summon other players later, you've got Crimson Kat, Crimson's player character she named after her streamer name, standing in your version of the game world.
"Hah, nice name!" Indeed, Jacqueline Elizabeth Frostqueen Surrusprise Rapierina III. is a great name for a game character. "Gotta say though, the saw spear? Really? Kinda boring, innit?"
You nudge your controller to have your character face hers. "Hunter's axe. Literal beginner weapon. Sure you wanna handle so many stones in your glass house?"
"Hey, it's a great weapon with loads of reach and shit! Spin to win, baby!"
"I can poke things. Everything gets poked dead." You demonstrate the uncharged heavy attack for the benefit of the uninitiated. "Wanna get killing already?"
"Do I ever! Let'-"
A system message shows up, telling you some dickwaffle just invaded you.
Simultaneously and without having coordinated it, you and Crimson use the same gesture, jumping into the air with joy. "Oh yeah baby, someone's about to get ganked!"
"Gonna poke their balls off," you announce, leading the charge into the forest.
Meanwhile, your chat has started donating to you again, for some reason. Like, you won't complain, but it's not like you're giving them anything in exchange.
Kind of like simping, is what you're saying it is. Weirdoes.
We should totally do an OnlyFriends, bet people would pay big money to see my titties.
No. You categorically refuse. This body is yours and you ain't sharing it.
"Why do these guys have snakes coming out of their heads?!"
"They fucked the snake," you explain what the game is obviously trying to tell you in simple words.
"Pretty sure the snakes replaced their heads, Jackie."
"Best be careful with bestiality?"
"Fuck you and fuck every fucker in that snake fuckpit!" For some reason, those big balls of snakes spewing poison projectiles at everything that moves have pissed Crimson off. "Let me murder you already!"
"That's just their natural behavior," you point out. "They're having an orgy. We kind of are being rude by interrupting them."
"Nothing about this is natural! Look at the size of the big ones!"
"Bestiality can have unintended side effects." You nod, having figured out the real issue here. Crimson just isn't accounting for all the snakefucking going on.
"The fuck is this boss? Why is snakes coming out of them their second phase?!"
"Probably-"
"And they can do fire magic! Why can't we do fire magic?!"
"I've always been more of an ice girl," you comment, breathing out a few snowflakes to show her what you mean.
"Also- what the fuck are those giant-ass snakes everywhere?!"
You clear your throat. "They fucked the snake. Really well."
Long story short, lots of clips were made.
"Briaaan… Briaaan…" It hasn't gotten easier to find the plush toy responsible for many parts of your little operation ever since Mitsuki handed him the letter that let you know an audit was coming; if anything, it's actually gotten harder, as he's always running around downstairs, doing fuck-knows-what.
In fact, in your occasional efforts to locate him because you needed something from the little guy you've stumbled over no less than three huge-ass rooms full of hundreds of screens showing various parts of the basement, your home and a couple locations both nearby it and in the 'real' city you're apparently responsible for.
Or as responsible as you will ever accept being for anything. Which isn't much, but at least you never did start burning it down.
Yes, you still begrudge that whole escapade. Sure, the B Team kept the entirety of the population from being eaten by an angry undead flesh blob, but that doesn't mean you can't criticise the damage they caused while doing so.
Anyways, you actually did need Brian for something, so you eventually manage to retrieve him from a large factory complex hidden underground that, as best you can tell, was meant to produce a robot army or something, now being walled in and more or less hidden from easy access.
Finally, though, you have him right where you want him- on the kitchen table, sitting there with both yourself and Chuckie to discuss a matter of truly grave importance.
Namely, the matter of brain juice and whether it makes sense to take the product, a sample of which has already been gathered by Chuckie, and somehow distill or improve upon it to make more of the original brain juice that was used to make those uppity brain plants to begin with.
"Chuuh, the product would suffer from too much post-processing, but still better than what most dealers would cut it with."
You tilt your head, but Chuckie is the one that asks the question before you can. "Wait a moment, are intelligence-enhancing potions illicit substances in the magical world?"
"Puchuuh, some are, yes," Brian nods. "Mostly because the original substance, in this case, was made out of a plethora of human brains, chuh. Most 'upstanding' folks take issue with that, puuh, which is why it can be so hard to get."
Huh. You wouldn't have known that if he didn't explain. Then again, it doesn't really stop you, either. Though this does put the whole thing where the brain in the cube bribed you to leave it alone with this stuff into a whole new context…
Alright, all thoughts about your future drug empire aside, it is now time for Magical Girl Detective Jackie to step forth! Seeing as all hell is inevitably going to break loose whenever this 'audit' is going to happen, you figure you may as well get your ducks in a row ahead of time- reduce the amount of stuff you potentially have to deal with at the same time.
Also, seeing a you're theoretically in charge of this city and all, you probably should look into anything that actually disappears people sooner rather than later. The last thing you need is some nosy auditor trying to inspire any of your underlings to try and replace you.
If you must show dominance to let your natural dominance be accepted by all, then so be it. The Supreme Ice Type shall strike once again!
Actually, while Ice Moves are generally really good, the typing itself is pretty horrible defensively due to how many weaknesses it has and how few resistances to make up for that.
Lies and slander! None shall defeat the mighty Ice Type, the games just missed the nuance, the fine dose of reality that you shall administer to any that stand against your Ice Type agenda!
Hey, I didn't make the typing table. Blame GamingFreak, not me.
…But yeah, anyways, time to look into the thing. In the industrial North of the city, where people apparently started disappearing recently. Bigly important business, yes yes.
Annoyingly enough, you do not, in fact, immediately find the isue you're here to resolve.
Mightily rude of whatever it is, to be such a pain to actually locate. Your first instinct is to fly above the rough area Melanie pointed out to you a being notable, to circle it while looking out for any notable magical signatures you can make out from a distance. Which is what you indeed do, just because it's a very good approach to this kind of thing.
After all, if a monster's down there, you will naturally spot it this way, right? Except no, you don't actually get any of that. Instead, all you can find are sparsely populated streets lined by warehouses and crap, little business being done anywhere you see.
Not even the seediest of the alleyways you fly over even contain any funny business, muggers, drug dealers or whatever other criminals may hang out in the area not up for getting to work this early in the morning. You'd complain about their lacking motivation, except you're both aware most of them keep on pulling their manhours deep into the night and you're not a damn boomer.
So screw that line of thinking entirely, you suppose. Anyways, you don't spy any obvious monster activity the entire time, no inhuman creatures scrambling or slithering or amorphously floating around the place. Nor do you find any traces of the disappeared people- blood stains actually stand out against concrete if you know how they look, but as you said, no dice.
This leaves a couple of possibilities open. It could be that whatever it is you're hunting only comes out at certain times- you remember what feels like decades ago but is more a couple months, back when you first started doing this job and had to stake out an area all night to see the Glowwolf you were after appear. It may well be that your quarry only come here to hunt, then leaves to parts unknown, retreating into a lair of some sort.
Alternatively, maybe it's just extremely stealthy, or has a way to circumvent your magical senses. Always possible, that, even if you doubt it. You are very good at sniffing out magical stuff. Then again, maybe it's just-
You pause, the light of the morning sun catching on something irregularly down in one of the alleys you were surveying for completion's sake. Squinting your eyes, you slowly approach, steering your icy platform at a slight tilt to get a better look.
Huh. Thin, nearly invisible threads are laid out, as though to capture anyone passing through this place before they can see anything. In the dark between the walls of both adjacent buildings, it would be pretty damn hard to make them out before stumbling right into them, especially if you're some normie failing to pay attention to your surroundings.
This web you've found is also, you note as you pull out your phone to turn on the flashlight app on it for an even better look, entirely nonmagical- not that you'd believe for a single moment this crap is anything close to mundane. It's obviously the work of a monster or, failing that, this has to be the work of a magical person, at least.
Either way it's obviously worth following up on. Time to look for more of this kind of shit.
In the end, you find three more of those nets set up in the district full of warehouses you've come to consider part of the industrial district of town (which isn't technically correct, or at least it wasn't until you decided that this is how it is now), each them currently 'unoccupied', which speaks to you more of the creature making use of them having set up new traps recently than a lack of victims.
More importantly, though, you've managed to find what you were after. A trace leading you back to the source of these threads.
At first you thought of marking down the locations of the webs on a map of the area, courtesy of Gorgle Maps, and then figuring out the center of the triangle created by these locations, but that didn't work out. All you found was a dusty warehouse filled with canned food, some of which you went ahead and threw into your storage box to make up for the disappointment- they had canned peaches, which you actually kind of like.
Now they have a palette's worth of the stuff less, but hey, nobody's gonna notice, you're sure. Stuff gets lost in transit all the time, due to logistical snags, paperwork errors, the works.
What finally let you make a breakthrough was another go at investigating those webs themselves. Aside from the barely visible thread running from wall to wall to turn alleyways into death traps, you also managed to find yourself one more, even better camouflaged line of thread, one that proceeds to run from the trap all the way to another warehouse.
Checking back with the other webs, they, too, have one of those things connecting them to the same place. Quite obviously, whatever this monster is it uses these to sense vibrations, letting it know if and when prey wanders into its traps.
Those nature documentaries Elena made you watch with her to try and help you past your entomophobia (and, more precisely in this case, arachnophobia) are coming in handy now, you're starting to recall details of your past life down to trivia you learned about on those occasions.
Still not worth it, of course. You always suspected she mostly did it to wig you out for her amusement.
Carefully floating around in the air, where no horrible creatures from mankind's nightmares can get at you, you spy on the insides of the warehouse the thread are running into. At first glance, there's nothing all that unusual, just an empty warehouse floor awaiting beyond the windows you manage to find, but as you keep on looking, you slowly come to a realization.
The ground isn't made of concrete. It only looks like that at first. I truth, it is made up of thousands and millions of threads, tightly interwoven to give the impression of solid ground.
It's one giant antlion pit, except in the form of a huge-ass web. Your skin crawls with unpleasant sensations as you just consider what might be waiting at the bottom.
When Kerrie, Olivia and Bubbles received the message Jackie sent, each of them hurriedly did what they could to respond in a timely manner. Olivia feigned a medical emergency in class, leading to Kerrie pretending to help her go catch some fresh air, the two of them leaving school with all due haste and stealth to avoid making it look like they were playing hooky.
Sure, that was more or less what they'd done the last time Jackie called for them, but it may well be that there was an actual emergency this time, and being relied on to have the strong magical girl's back was something that filled both of them with a sense of pride neither of them could truly articulate.
Mitsuko, incidentally, saw them leaving in a hurry, transformed and rushing towards the back entrance of the school, but she couldn't find an excuse to pull herself away from the gaggle of girls she had attracted to her side through a combination of her looks, wealth and kindness. Truly, heavy was the brow that wore the crown of the queen bee.
Bees were never meant to wear a crown, after all.
Regardless, the two delinquent girls were soon joined by their blondest of comrades, Bubbles, who also brought none other than Snaketail with her, the snake-like Puchuu whose 'preferred' name was not particularly creative, but at least fitting. All three of them assembled, their movement speed only increased, for Bubbles had actually bought a car through dubious channels using perhaps even more dubious earnings.
That said, neither of the other two wanted to comment on it. It was her business and her decision what she did in her own time, neither of them felt they had the right to disapprove.
Even if they did make her swear she wasn't having sex in her new car before they got in. Getting some STD for sitting down in there was not what either of them considered a good reason to have to go to the hospital a month down the line.
And explain exactly what happened to their parents. No thanks.
It was such that they soon came upon the place Jackie was awaiting them in, once they'd found an open parking space. Which was an ordeal in itself, parking being what it was, but at least Bubbles had practiced driving a little and could do all of this without banging the vehicle up anywhere.
The moment they drew near enough, a trio of platforms made of ice materialized in front of them, allowing the three to join Jackie herself in short order, floating up in the air as though they were supervillains about to launch their dastardly ambush upon the heroes down below.
Except they were the heroes and here to defeat something evil. Presumably. Kerrie supposed it wouldn't hurt to check. "Jackie? Are you okay?"
The white-haired girl looked faintly haunted, as though she wasn't getting enough sleep… or had seen something truly horrible in the last half an hour. "I'm fine. Needed you guys here to burn some stuff."
She was not a pyromaniac. It wasn't like she particularly wanted to watch things burn. That said, she was a literal magical girl and she could do literal magic, so excuse her for thinking that was awesome and cool and she wanted to do it at every opportunity. "Just point me at what needs to be killed with fire!"
Remotely burning away the three webs set out as traps was simple enough for Kerrie, to the point Olivia didn't particularly need to pay attention to the briefly flaring flames below the formation of platforms Jackie was controlling.
Instead, she was looking at Jackie herself. For some reason, the green-haired girl had the impression that the ice-focused magical girl had been oddly distant lately, but she still had known her for the longest among everyone present; something was bothering her, that much was obvious just by reading her expression and body language.
Jackie wasn't necessarily the most expressive, but it was still pretty easy to see when she was actually feeling any particular way by watching the tilt of her head and eyes. And when she was actually feeling anything in particular, she often did jump all the way to almost exaggerated facial expressions, weird poses and more.
In this case, something had her spooked, something that kept on bothering her all the way to what was apparently the nest of whatever monster they were fighting today once Kerrie had worked her magic (heh) on the traps it had placed.
"Ah, I got it!" Olivia exclaimed, smacking her fist into her open palm.
"Got what?" Bubbles asked, yawning. She had a weird sleep schedule sometimes.
"I figured out why Jackie is scared!"
"…I'm not scared. You're scared."
Ignoring the person in question, she just continued right on. "Jackie is really afraid of bugs, so since we're coming after a monster that's probably a large spider-"
"You're also stupid. Nobody will ever listen to anything you say because you're always wrong."
Jackie had been talking more recently, but that didn't make her any less vitriolic when she wanted to be. Also, that 'word a day' calendar had 'vitriolic' on it for today, and she figured it applied well enough.
"Well, let's not dawdle around so much, then," Kerrie asserted, hand on her sword to draw it at a moment's notice. It was a really cool weapon, though not as cool as Olivia's electric twin spears.
And she was right- they'd stopped for some reason, in the middle of transit. The one responsible didn't get all of them moving, however, and instead just made Bubbles float over towards herself.
Then, when their platforms were touching, she grabbed the blonde with both arms. Said blonde just shrugged and hugged her back.
"…What're you doing?" Olivia asked, feeling it was a reasonable question.
Jackie pouted at her from below Bubbles' shoulder. "Emotional support Bubbles," she said as though that was an explanation.
Which it actually kind of was. "Hah, so you do admit you're scared."
"Shut up. Stupid lettuce head."
Bubbles just stood there letting Jackie hug her, thinking about what she would rather do than wait for this whole thing to be over. Mainly sex, in other words. Sadly, she had the impression her two teammates wouldn't appreciate her more effectively handling the shortest girl among them.
Mostly by deepthroating her. People usually were, like, too preoccupied to be scared when she did that.
But, like, whatever. She'd settle for ice cream, too. Not that there was any ice cream in sight, which just went to show this joint was, like, so un-fly. But they had work to do, and it wasn't the good kind of work.
Fuck, what she wouldn't give to get fucked right now, for cash or otherwise. Or a coffee, at least, dammit. It was too damn early in the morning for this shit.
At least Jackie was being a cutie-pie as always. Ah well. "So how are we doing this?" She asked, vaguely gesturing towards the warehouse they were here for with the hand not busy slowly rubbing the white hair of the girl clinging to her. "We busting in through the windows or, like, busting a hole into the walls?"
"Yeah, we probably shouldn't get in there until we're sure it's safe," Kerrie agreed, still holding onto her weeb sword. "If it's more threads, I should be able to burn them out, but we need an opening first."
"Pretty sure only one of us has the firepower to break down a wall on the fly," Olivia added, lookin over at Bubbles. Or at Jackie, rather.
Jackie who, without looking up, casually raised a hand gripping one of her magnum hand cannon plus toy water-gun things. A single pull of the trigger produced one of those big, chonky, person-sized icicles she used, rotating as it floated in front of the muzzle for a moment before it shot off.
It hit the building with the force of, like, an artillery shell or something, drilling through the brick wall and sending those same bricks flying of in all directions, though mostly inside the warehouse. The ice disappeared quickly this time, instead of sticking around, though it still pierced into the ground inside.
It was pretty obvious that something was up with that floor, too. Less like solid matter and more like… cloth, kinda. Meant Bubbles' magic might come in handy later, though she couldn't really take control of so many fibers at once… That was a not of web woven into a large mass, after all.
Moments later, the thick webs started unraveling of their own accord, revealing several bodies partially stuck in this whole mess. And, deep down, where the light reaching through the newly created opening could just barely reach, something moved… And creeped out of the tunnel the silk was now building.
Pale blue light reflected in brief flashes, eight weirdly colored eyes visible in the dark even before they were fully visible. A soft scratching noise joined slow, inhuman skittering, like a giant spider squishing through its web.
(Bubbles knew that sound way too well thanks to some of the things they'd fought together with Jackie before.)
A white-furred paw came first, then a white claw-thing, its blue glow growing more visible as it bent and shifted to bring the creature into sight. A large, white wolf, with two rows of three wide, staring eyes, another pair set on its brows, a spider's fangs poking out of the snout bearing jagged teeth bared in obvious threat.
Half its body was replaced with that of a giant fucking spider, its legs sharp and gleaming as they carried the monster. The large, bulbous body was glowing in its trademark neon blue here and there, brutally pulsing veins running all over it.
Jackie was shivering violently now, pushing her face against Bubbles' lower chest. Poor girl. "I think Jackie might be having, like, an aneurysm."
"Told ya she's afraid of bugs."
"Not helping, Olivia!" Kerrie called out.
"Yeah, not cool, girl. Like, we don't talk about your obvious abandonment issues either, do we?"
"What?! I don't have anything like that!"
"Suuure. Whatever ya say, Miss Talks-In-Her-Sleep."
"Hey!"
"Girls, maybe focus on the monster now, repressed issues later?" Kerrie just always had to be all reasonable and shit, huh?
The state of affairs is not acceptable. This cannot continue. This cannot continue. This cannot continue.
Why is it always giant bugs?! Is it a punishment for your sins? If so, karma can go suck it, you refuse to change. Is it some cosmic irony at your expense? In that case, whatever deities are having a laugh at your expense better hope you'll never find out who they are, or else lube up their assholes real good before then, because you sure won't care when the time of reckoning comes.
The more you think about it, the angrier you become.
"Alright, stand back, girls, I'm burning the webs!"
Kerrie's right. Thou shalt not suffer the bugs to live. You must kill them fire to make sure none of them are left.
"Uh, guys? Jackie's, like, vibrating over here."
And they shall fear the coming of the Jackie, for they shall perish in the flames of disgust.
And you have just the thing to do it with, too.
Hurriedly searching through the storage cube you carved out of the remains of your past prey, you pull out and discard an old chocolate bar wrapper, an empty smartphone casing, a random plushie- you put it back in, you can still use this-
Ah, there you go. The lamp within which a certain Efreet is sealed for your convenience.
"Is she alright? Should we retreat for a bit to let her calm down?"
You move Kerrie and Olivia aside, only keeping Bubbles close so you can use her as a shield for your eyes. "Outta the way. Efreet, I choose you!"
A stream of flame shoots out of the oil lamp's opening, spreading out like a cat lazily stretching itself (a feeling you can sympathize with, but now's not the time) as it coalesces into the form of the demonic spirit (as opposed to a demon, yes) you hold control over.
"Haaah…" She exhales, her voice like blisters on the surface of one's skin, her spaded tail sinuously flowing up and down her form. "What have you called me for this time, brat?"
You point out in the general direction of the monstrous animal whose existence is anathema to all that is good and Jackie, still hiding your face in Bubbles' bubbles. "Big bug. Kill it. Now."
"Well, at least you're straightforward enough."
"Jackie?" Kerrie asks, sounding only mildly alarmed. "What is that naked fire lady?"
"Loot from Egypt," you shrug, waiting for the sounds of destruction to announce you can look again.
They don't take long. With a massive fwoosh, a massive ball of flame rams itself into the warehouse's roof, breaking through it effortlessly and turning its concrete into melting chunks of heat that serve as shrapnel as the magical attack, distorting the air around it with a heat haze that makes it look like it's shifting like a liquid on the way down.
Then it impacts the target, the web at the floor of the place, the… The thing that serves as a mockery of all canines everywhere (which isn't allowed, only cats are allowed to make fun of them, good-naturedly of course) torn back down to the bottom of the pit it dug from where it was trying to flee in a blind panic.
Drawn into the very core of the burning spell like this, the heat suddenly increases massively, turning the warehouse into a blazing inferno. You hear an inhuman screech, too many large legs kicking out and trying to escape, but in the end this monster's fate was sealed the moment it decided to make its nest in your damn city.
As it damn well should be.
The Efreet you summoned nods, satisfied, when her attack starts to slowly fizzle out. "Been a while since I was allowed to go all out. Make sure to refill the lamp and do this again sometime soon, mhm?"
With that, she returns back to her lamp, just a rash of fire spreading through reality until it's gone.
"Hey Jackie, can I move already?" Bubbles asks. "I think my back might have sunburn now. Y'know, 'cause it's not really covered by my outfit."
Olivia hops from her ice platform over to yours, rubbing her forehead a little. "Might be. I feel like my eyebrows might've burned off and you were closer and all."
Kerrie, for her part, is… pouting, you think? "I could've burnt this thing with way less collateral damage…"
Too bad. A point had to be made and you made it, simple as that. Take that, bug-kind of all varieties!
In the end, you didn't really need all that much help from the B team, but while you have them here already- they hardly can just go back to school in the middle of the classes you pulled them from, after all- you go ahead and have them help you lift the ruined, smoking corpse of the… thing (you still refuse to find a better word) out of the crater left where it was fire-nuked out of existence.
There is something beautiful about the sheer destruction, even though it was wrought using an objectively inferior kind of magic (fire is too hot and lacks the elegant, efficient simplicity of decimation unique to ice magic, after all), it just also… Well, left a scorched, slightly crumbling body behind. Then again, you're mildly surprised it left anything behind at all, so maybe this thing was tougher than you expected.
Like, you're well aware some monsters can be extremely hard to actually kill hard enough they die, but on the other hand, this whole thing Efreet did was pretty damn destructive. So… Well, food for thought.
You still want the body, so once Snaketail shows up again, having temporarily disappeared during the 'fight', such as it was, you make him help you convince the three that you will dispose of the monster's remains to keep the first responders already moving towards the scene from accidentally hurting themselves.
Hah. As if people needed the assistance to mindfuck themselves into disbelieving anything and everything the Veil hides from them. Nah, you just want at least some loot out of this, even if the corpse is pretty… Well, it's more or less structurally intact still, as you already briefly pondered, so you can probably get something out of it, at least.
One of the two still unbroken bladed limbs shatters while the four of you load it up onto an ice platform, but hey, there's still some parts that could be salvaged. Theoretically. You'll have to have Brian take a look.
No reason not to give it a try, as long as that audit hasn't started yet. As a former corporate drone, you are well aware that all you need to do is to keep everything in the exact right conditions to assure whoever is swinging around to take a look at your operation here that there's nothing untoward going on, then the moment the audit is over you can do whatever you want again.
After all, as long as they haven't been able to prove anything before, they won't suddenly gain the ability to do so afterwards. Unless magical audits involve leaving behind highly-authorized observers for a while, which you doubt.
…You'll ask Brian about it, you suppose, just in case. Just as soon as you get this oversized insect-mammal thing back home.
Wolfspider Rewards
Wolfsbane: A simple, ingle-edged short sword made out of a Wolfspider's leg. Sharp and strong enough to cut through thin metal sheets without issue, this pale-blue weapon designed for stabbing rolls for attacks with AGI, deals 1d15 piercing damage per success and ignores up to 2 Armor
Wolf Silk: Body modification that uses a Wolfspider's spinnerets in the tips of your fingers. Allows the creation of Wolfspider silk, which is unusually strong and resistant to most damage, including fire damage. Does not come with the skills required to weave in combat, but using it slowly and carefully can be done creatively and at will. Takes up Hands Slot.
Vials of Sticky Essence: Vial of pale grey liquid that can, among other uses, be used to enchant objects. Gives sticky, glue-like attributes.
Vials of Magical Essence: Vial of golden-yellow liquid commonly used in enchanting objects by those who know how, may be applied to gain the equivalent power of 2-5 bronze coins upon enchanting objects, stacking at minimum two vials regardless of materials used.
Vials of Animal Essence: Vial of pale green and red liquid that can, among other uses, be used to enchant objects. Gives animalistic, wild and sometimes feral attributes.
18 Bronze: Reward for the body of a Wolfspider. Is reduced for any other rewards chosen.
Wolfspider
A chimeric union between a large wolf and an even larger spider, Wolfspiders are solitary hunters that primarily act through setting out webs as traps in prey-rich areas, from lush forests to populated cities. Largely diurnal by nature, they only come out in the hours of sunrise or sunset to spin their webs, then occasionally wander out of their lair when they detect prey having been caught in them.
Surprisingly good diggers, they often fortify their lair by digging out a sizeable amount of soil, concrete or anything in the same direction, replacing the ground with a large mass of their silk spun to give the impression of whatever floor they replace. Any local wildlife (including the bipedal kind) that meanders upon this lair is additional, free prey for it.
While this monster acts as a solitary predator hunting through traps, it naturally acts to amass prey it has caught, injecting it with a paralytic venom that kills quickly, but also preserves the bodies for later consumption. Through this method, the Wolfspider builds up a collection of food brought back to its lair and, when it judges it has amassed enough, will go out to find a mate.
Female Wolfspiders exclusively mate with male ones, but are relatively rare in nature. Instead, male Wolfspiders will often seek out female humans or similar, capturing them with a special venom that merely immobilizes them instead of killing. Once secured inside of its lair, it will proceed to use its sharp spider legs, otherwise used to dig alongside its paws, control its webs and for combat if cornered, to cut away any clothes in the way.
Once this is done, it will proceed to mate with the female using its canine penis, a process that may last between four to eight hours, once a day, consuming stockpiled prey and feeding digested slurry to its mate, unless it mates with another Spiderwolf. It will keep going indefinitely, even as its mate is pregnant, and generally display caring and even protective behavior towards them.
Some victims even grow to 'love' their abductors, even after giving birth to 2-3 live offspring after a term of approximately four months after conception. Wolfspider populations are slow to grow, but can do so at explosive rates unless kept in strict check.
Dissecting and taking apart the thing you ended up blowing apart with all due urgency is a little difficult, as a good part of its body was ever so slightly carbonized in the process of being made safe to handle (read, very very dead), but you can manage, and the effort seems to satisfy Brian to the point he just tells you what else there is to know about this species of monster as he usually does when you bring back something new.
You have to keep working on your little bestiary project, the files you keep saved on your phone for later reference as well as a way to keep souvenirs from your past enemies, if only in the form of knowledge about them. Well, that any actual trophies you keep in the form of body parts you use to make equipment or implant into yourself.
Most of this one is borderline unusable, yes, but that just means you threw it into your essence furnace to recycle it after you extracted the still usable parts. Meaning you now have a slender, pale blue sword in hand, fashioned out of the one sp*der leg that was still intact enough to be used by the time you brought the corpse home.
It's pretty neat. Short and mostly meant for stabbing, and it doesn't really fit into your own kit, but you think you'll go and give it to Chuckie later. She isn't really meant to fight anything, but you figure it's better to have a self-defense stabbinator on hand and not need it than need it and not have it.
And maybe she can tickle certain uppity plant life with it if it mucks up. Just a thought.
That aside, you also kept another little souvenir from this one, though, speaking of what's in your hands.
"Chuuh, are you sure about this? Even I know you're afraid of bugs, puchuh."
"Shaddup Brian," you drawl, looking over at the little shit that you have implanting monster body parts into yourself for greater power. "This isn't sp*der silk anymore, because it's not coming out of a spider. It's Jackie silk."
Indeed, your fingers now contain the still usable spinnerets of the creature you had incinerated for the Glory of the Jackie. Meaning that you shall now be able to weave Jackie silk with the sublime grace and practiced ease only a Jackie is capable of!
"…Chuh, walk me through that one. If you're going insane again, chuuh, I have to know ahead of time."
"Murh!" You complain. "It's simple. I'm taking everything away that makes a sp*der a sp*der so they stop existing already, see?"
"Puuh, it is very impressive you can actively censor yourself the way you are, by the way, puchuh," Brian tells you as he keeps up with your stride despite his much shorter legs. "Most humans cannot make obnoxious beeping sounds to disguise what they are saying, chuh."
"Eh. People do it on TV all the time," you wave him off. It's really nothing all that special.
Of course, the real battle of the day hasn't come to pass quite yet. No, you aren't talking about the temptation of plundering your own chocolate storage after lunch- you always do that either, there's no contest to begin with- but rather a confrontation whose outcome is not yet decided.
You may have lost a lot of your built up chocolate fruits, but you shall bathe in molten chocolate yet! It shall be glorious, sticky and slightly weird once it cools down for long enough, and you refuse to let this be taken from you!
But mysterious theft aside (personally, your favorite theories are that either you were sleepwalking and 'accidentally' ate them in your sleep one night or else Elena secretly stole them at some point while you kept her summoned and stashed them away somewhere you don't know about- either way it was still you that took them, which is the only outcome you can accept), you still have a thing to do. Hence you once more venture out above the streets of Общий город, the city you have come to call your home in the past couple of months.
Coasting along far and above the traffic going on beneath your notice, you do not take long to arrive near your destination: The beach. Not only is the sandy expanse that serves as the main draw to local tourism (let's be honest, a typical small west coast city is nothing interesting enough to draw in anyone if it doesn't have at least this much) surprisingly scenic as the sun starts to sink beyond the horizon, it also contains the person you were looking to meet.
Nessie is in the water near her house when you arrive, the rocky outcroppings protecting her private little section of the beach wide enough to range all the way into the ocean, providing her with a fully private section of the shore to swim around in without being bothered most of the time.
This is where you find her this time, though you do not approach her closer quite yet. Mostly because of what you can see she's busy doing.
Now, there's any number of ways one could explain the presence of a large cloud of white fluid spreading through the water around the local shark woman lifeguard, but just in case anyone was inclined to do so, Nessie is actually floating right on the surface of the water, the two hands tightly gripping her dick visible as they speed along the shafts of her hemipenes.
Someone is really worked up and has been jerking off into the ocean for a bit. You can't be sure, but it may or may not have something to do with the notable softening of her midsection; for some reason, you doubt Nessie has been putting on weight since you last saw her, so you'll go and assume the small bump on her belly is caused by something else.
You smile very smugly, up on your floating ice platform. Obviously, when you last met and fucked her, you managed to knock her up- contrary to her own meagre showing in that regard so far. Clearly, your superior seed wasted no time growing within her womb, whereas her fishy splooge is clearly incapable of doing the same to you!
…That said, coming closer to her right now may or may not be smart, you consider as you watch a small fountain of said splooge erupt, the momentary relief clearly not enough for Nessie as the amazonian shark woman wastes no time in keeping going for more right away once she's done growling in release.
Chances are she'd try to fuck you the moment she saw you, she's just that horny. The part of you that's Elena recognizes that look on her face, and it is one that is completely absent in the entirety of your history as Jackie. No, you are above such things, as-
We both know that's a lie, so let's just focus a little here.
Urk… Alright, fine. You originally came here to scout around for any potential Overcity passages underwater, to try and open up a way for Minako to come and go from the ocean under her own power, so your plan initially involved asking Nessie if she'd ever accidentally used one of those in the area, but that's pretty much a wash, you suppose.
Because that much remains true, if you come closer, you'll have a fight on your hands just to fend off the horny shark's advances. She looks ready to have her way with just about any warm hole she can get her hands on.
…Well, you do have a way to resolve this situation easily enough. All you need to do is to let Nessie work her horny off of on someone, and as it happens you actually have a certain someone in mind for that job already.
Luckily, you do have the numbers of the entirety of the B team, so you need but a moment to dial up and move back and forth a little to get some decent reception up where you're flying.
"Hey Bubbles. Wanna fuck a shark amazon with a big dick?"
"Yeah. I know I'm awesome. Same beach I took you guys to."
"She's really horny and won't stop jerking off. Figure she'll just grab and fuck you the moment you show up."
"No worries. You can pay me back some other time."
Yet another good deed committed by yours truly.
Bubbles doesn't take long to show up… Nor does she take long to be seized by Nessie once you coach her into coming her way. The blonde whose 'clothes' are less made of fabric and more a collection of string held together by the way it tightly adorns her body doesn't exactly object when said lingerie is ripped off of her the moment the shark woman gets her hands on her- in fact, she squeals in approval as that happens.
It's actually kind of impressive, the local life guard moves faster than your eyes can really keep up with for a moment as soon as she sights a set of holes on legs. Handling Bubbles like an enthusiastically consenting doll, she immediately pins her to the ground and tears her magical girl 'costume' to shreds.
Can't let that stuff get in the way of a proper dicking, after all. You fully understand and sympathize there. Panties can be fun and all, but they have a dreadful tendency to make fucking more complicated than it has to be, especially when worn under skirts.
And most of them aren't even magical panties like your own. What are they even for at that point? If you have to waste a moment after flipping over a girl's skirt to get them off, you demand they justify their existence to you!
…Well, your unexpected resentment towards panties when they aren't sexy enough aside, you watch on from above as Nessie lines herself up, slamming both sides of her hemipenis into Bubbles with the force of a thousand horny virgin teenagers. Stuffing both her ass and her pussy, the growling roar of satisfaction that rings out as the shark monster woman proceeds to get as much of herself into the blonde magical girl as she can.
Judging by the wide-open lips being licked by her tongue, Bubbles does very much enjoy this treatment. Very good. Now all you have to do is sit back and wait for Nessie to be done.
So you wait, lounging atop your icy throne, watching and waiting.
And waiting. And waiting. And waiting some more, the rugged form of Nessie not stopping its urgent thrusting for longer than it takes to adjust Bubbles' position every time she fills her up with her shark sperm. She's really got a lot of motivation to keep going, you guess.
Your attention kind of drifts off at some point and you start to add onto your ice platform a little halfway through, constructing a proper throne made of the stuff, with a seat perfectly molded to comfortably fit your butt despite how hard ice tends to be, some rail guards on the edges, even some decorations in the form of pictures of yourself defeating various monsters carved into the material here and there.
When you run out of space on that end, you decide against making more space by conjuring more ice and instead pull out your smartphone, fiddling with it to look up random stuff on the internet. Oh hey, random politician did random politic thing. How riveting.
Honestly, people are hard on serial murderers and psychopaths, but the real killers are still the ones that sit in congress and shit. You have the moral high ground when it comes to politician types, and that's saying something.
Eventually getting bored, you take another quick look, but while Bubbles looks like she was some cheap inflatable sex doll with the way her belly is bulging with cum, nothing really new happened. So you get back on expanding on your platform.
In the end, you're halfway through converting it into this awesome palanquin before Nessie finally slows down, grunting and exhaling deeply as she winds down a bit. Still pistoning Bubbles like a steam engine, but one that's been taken down a notch after expending…
Two hours' worth of steam?! Damn, you've been having the patience of a saint with this shit so far. Yep, that's just how it is.
Drifting downwards, closer to the small sand pit that was created when Nessie started to literally pound Bubbles into the ground (magical girl resilience has to be the one reason her skin made it through that without damage) filled with significant amount of bodily fluid slowly seeping away into the sand, you clear your throat, still sitting inside your utterly majestic, half-finished palanquin driven by naught but your own magic.
"Hey."
"Rrrgh… You want some of this, too?" Nessie asks, her eyes still aglow with the same thing you feel any time you see chocolate. She's obviously still raring to go, but at least she's regained enough higher thought to do words now.
Obviously, Operation Chewing Bubblegum was successful. Sure, Bubbles is pretty much out of commission, hanging in Nessie's arms at most half-conscious, but that's a sacrifice she was all too happy to make, so you can't really even call that a drawback.
"Nah. I sent Bubbles here to you so you could work that horny off before we talked."
Huffing and puffing, Nessie initiates the lengthy, squelching process of pulling Bubbles' tight orifices off her cocks. "Could'a fooled me," she smirks at you, breathy sounds coming from her sharp-tooth mouth.
Unfortunately, wrangling the shark into just telling you what you want to know isn't really possible- mostly because she wouldn't actually know to differentiate Overcity pathways from the rest of the environment in the first place. Not everyone can be a superior organism such as yourself, after all.
That said, as far as Brian was able to tell you, these kinds of magical 'gates' don't really pop up outside of actual cities, which does make sense of a sort; they do lead to the literal city dimension, after all, so if you think about it as a magical phenomenon that just, like, connects cities and cityscapes…
Well, not like the details matter all that much. All you can say for sure is that you don't really need to bother looking for any of the things out in the open ocean, because there won't be any.
Instead, you need to ask Nessie for any places around the immediate area of the beach that fit the bill, any particularly weird currents that don't work the way they should, especially notable nooks or crannies or even underwater caves… Those sorts of things, situated right next to the beach, seem like they would be your best bet.
The beach lifeguard, currently in a satisfied, weakened state after rutting Bubbles into a short-lived coma, obliges to your demands as is only suitable, given your station in comparison to hers. And, as it so happens, she does have something for you right away.
A short swim during which you make use of the talisman that allowed yourself to breathe underwater the last time you had to fight in the ocean later, you emerge inside a cave some way off the beach itself, but still somewhere along the coastline right next to the city. There is air in here, but not much, and you have to shake your hair out a little as you surface inside.
"Well, here we are. Place is weird 'cause there shouldn't be any air in here, but there ya go," Nessie informs you, gesturing around you.
The cave isn't too large, but still perfectly big enough to let maybe a handful of people fit inside, or up to two enter and exit at once. While you're not an expert on how exactly the dynamics of water and air and one being trapped under the other work out, you'll go out on a limb here and assume Nessie knows what she's talking about, presumably having explored more underwater stuff than most sapient beings ever do their entire lives.
You also do feel a bit of a draft in here, which shouldn't be possible, at least if it weren't for the faintly glowing piece of magic you make out inside the cave wall.
"Huh. This is actually the right place," you nod. "Good work, sharkie."
"Heh, don't mention it, shortie." Hey, you aren't short! You make efficient use of your height! That's totally different! "So there's some funky magic shit in here?"
"Mhm," you make, squinting a little at the hole-shaped chunk of magic radiating from the back of the craggy cave, puddles of saltwater in the way notwithstanding. Actually deciphering what the requirements are for passing through these things can take a moment, as you have to interpret a bunch of information that doesn't really translate to normal human senses as it is, but… "There. You have to hold your breath while counting backwards?"
Doing just that with a big gulp of air, you walk forward, into and through the sheer rock making up the cave. The moment you do, you find yourself stepping out of a wall in the middle of an empty street, the ever-present nighty sky of the Overcity above you.
Looks like you actually found what you were looking for. Now you just need to figure out a way to connect this pathway to your property, specifically to the pool you set up for Minako, and you should be golden.
You like gold. It's a precious thing and you like watching light bounce off of it. People should give you more gold to appease your terrible, terrible wrath in general.
"Eeeeey! Lookie who's up for a nookie, it's-a-me, Crimson! And Jackie, we're doing co-op again!"
"Hello chat. Shut up so I can focus."
"Now we're gonna be continuing right where we left off, at this creepy graveyard thingy. Gotta be honest, I like the spooky atmosphere they got going, but then the whole game's full of this stuff to begin with, amirite?"
"Eh. I was in an abandoned hospital once. About the same creepiness factor."
"Really? Why would you…"
"Work. Hunting monsters."
"Aah, right, you were a magical girl! I completely forgot 'cause it never comes up!"
"Work is work. I don't bring it up when I'm gaming."
-Uoooh! So much loooore!
-So like, is this new and are they improvising or has she been waiting until now to bring this up?
-V-Tubers put a ton of effort into their personas, no way are they improvising
-UUUU bratty little onee-sama sugoi!
-Oh great, the weebs have found us
-Are any mods around?
-What mods?
"ARGH GET IT OFF MY FACE GET IT OFF MY FACE!"
"It's a nasty bug. Go away, go away."
"Ugh… What are these guys, some kind of fly-people?"
"Byrgenwerth scholars. They studied-"
"Don't say it. Please."
"They fucked the flies."
"Dammit Jackie!"
-Fly fuckers
-fly fuckers
-Fucking flies
-Eh, mosquitoes are worse around summer
"You know, it's almost unfair when we're fighting NPCs two versus one."
"Watch out."
"Whadda ya- Oh mother trucker!"
"Spellcasting ahead."
"THAT'S A HUGE-ASS LASER EXPLOSION! That damage is fucking bonkers!"
"Should've invested in vigor."
"Why aren't you dying?!"
"'Cause I dodge instead of facetank. Also, time to poke her in the pussy."
-Ouch
-Yeah, that actually really hurts women just as much men
-The invincible poking machine appears once again
-Hey guys I looked it up, this game comes out sometimes next year apparently
-whoa, rlly?
-Super-super early access? I'd definitely get this game as soon as it comes out.
-The anime waifu ad strategy works
"Jump in already."
"Nuo! I got a fear of heights!"
"You're such a cat."
"Hey! That's species-ist and you will take that back!"
"It's a compliment. Ugh. Whatever. Come and make m-"
"What's wrong, Jackie? You having connection errors? Everything on your end stopped moving."
"…"
"And now your eye's twitching."
"Read. The boss health bar name."
"'Rom the Vacuous Spider'?"
"Sp*der."
"Did you just… censor yourself with a 'beep' in real time? How the heck…"
"Someone else made that joke already recently. Also, false alarm."
"Huh?"
"It's just a caterpillar with centipede legs."
"I mean, still creepy, but sure, it's not much of a spider. Ah, the adds just spawned i-"
"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA-"
-THE SCREEEAAAAM!
-the scream has arrived
-The spider scream
-Jackie has a really nice voice acctually
-Wanna bet this'll be the first clip someone makes of this stream?
-Ask and thou shalt receive
-LINK
The day after you discover this reasonably convenient juncture between normal reality and the Overcity, you quickly launch into great and terrible works that shall see you subjugate the entirety of reality in a grand spectacle of utter domination-
You basically finish up on a little crafting project you were working on, another of those Escape Talismans you have to fuel with a silver coin and that take several damn hours to make properly just because carving the rune required to make them work into several layers of human skin stapled onto each other just right.
It's a pain, is what you're saying, but one that's probably worth it. Considering the kinds of threats you're up against on the regular, one of them might well turn out more powerful than expected one of these days, or the audit you're expecting to happen at some point might be more… intense than anticipated, or… Any number of things like that, really.
Having an easy way to get out of a sticky situation to return later on with the appropriate amount of 'fuck you' prepared to counter whatever forced you to extricate yourself from it is invaluable in this business. There's a reason you put a lot of effort into giving yourself the ability to effectively fly, staying out the range of a lot of threats entirely, after all.
Being supremely powerful is good. Being supremely powerful while also categorically denying the opposition the ability to fight back is even better. And no, none of what you do is cowardly, nor are you at any point fleeing from an enemy, to make that clear.
At most you secure a tactical advantage through delaying the continuation of a battle. Get that memorized, because the history books telling tales of your glorious accomplishments shall accurately describe it as such. Or else.
All that aside, you also feast upon a chocolate cake Chuckie made using some of the chocolate fruits of the chocolate trees you got Viridis to make for you. The cake's soft, chocolate-y goodness, perfectly bite-able consistency and glaze made of boiled Viridian fruits and more chocolate fruits are the stuff of legends and you shall extoll their virtues forever.
Chuckie makes one damn good chocolate fruit cake. Another one for the history books.
You also arrange a proper strategy meeting with Brian for a few things that you expect to deal with, but, like, later in the day, as you had aforementioned crafting stuff to do first. You also, after some of your customary magical limbering exercises, endeavor to go and take care of whatever is going on with the park you first found Viridis inside of until then.
It's work that needs to be done and you want it out of the way in anticipation of the audit. Stuff popping up right on that one day you need to have things in order because someone higher up the food chain is around before disappearing back into the aether of having a private yacht and boardroom meetings to spend their time on is just the absolute worst.
You still remember that one time that happened at your old job. Essentially being the in-house IT department, you were solely responsible for shit, so even when half the building losing power wasn't caused by anything on your end and you still resolved the issue through some percussive maintenance after half an hour of chasing down the breaker box involved, it was still super awkward and uncomfortable.
No thanks. You'll give the kind of impression you need to and only then go back to the kind of constant, random chaos that is this city's usual status quo, thank you very much.
Motivated and ready for anything, you show up at the old park you pulled Viridis out of with promises of fertile soil and lots of cum, looking forward to figuring out yet another magical case as a magical girl. Look, most of your work pretty much ends up with you murdering or fucking something or someone, so you think you can be excused for being enthusiastic about it.
Talk about making your passions your job and all.
The place is pretty close to the Overcity pathway you used to use exclusively, before you brought freedom and Jackie-cracy to the mall in the Sprawl that used to be occupied by the… Non-Ice-Types you threw out of your sphere of influence. Truly, the nation of Jackietopia is the most just, free and righteous nation in existence!
When all your governing authority is derived from being yourself, anything you do is on principle justified, after all. It's kind of like how absolute monarchy works, just that instead of (falsely) claiming you reign over everyone because some god said that was how it is, you just declare that you are, inherently, by virtue of being yourself, the only person that can be trusted to hold complete authority in all regards.
You do not require rationalization. You're just that much better than everyone else, full stop.
But to get back to what you were doing, the park you remember scouring for unnatural happenings last time around is still there, looking more or less the same as before. Not supremely large, but plenty big enough still, certainly big enough to make it a chore to canvass its entirety for the culprit or culprits behind the reports you got from Melanie.
At least it's pretty scenic to make up for the hassle. You like the little lake.
The flora around here certainly does seem unnaturally verdant and lively, the scent of flourishing greenery thick in the warm summer air around you as you slowly make your way into the forested areas further in; the same general direction you remember finding Viridis in.
Not only is this the natural spot to start searching for anything that might've been left behind after she left, you can also see some bits and pieces of magic when you squint at the treeline from your vantage point atop the bridge, and so you soon get in there- sadly, your ice platforms are too big to let you fly in there with any reasonable speed, and even if you were to make them smaller, you'd just bump yourself into trees instead of them.
Even if a flying ice surfboard is a great idea and you shall endeavor to remember giving that idea a try later. There's something to be said for your rocking surfer bod, after all.
Yes, even and especially now. Your abs are still there, they're just hidden under the Ice Type layer of Ice Type fat on your belly! You're permanently prepared for winter, that's all this is and anyone that dares imply you're chubby gets shot then and there!
…Anyways, you have traces of magic to follow, and so you do. The little forest that Viridis put down all around is still going strong, but the mutated little creatures you saw back when she was here are missing entirely- just as you were expecting, without her direct influence they just didn't have the levels of atmospheric magic they needed to stay around.
So it's not that, not that you expected as much, but who or what else might be playing pranks and stealing stuff from people?
You continue to look around you as you go, but you can't find any traces of anything out of the ordinary. Not that you're all too surprised, plenty of monsters are surprisingly stealthy when they want to be, so you just chalk it up to this being true in this case, too.
There's a lot of green growing on the ground, grass and shrubbery and all that stuff, but you navigate around brambles and other environmental difficulties while resuming your walk without issue.
You make good time, so it shouldn't take longer than a minute or two to arrive. Whatever it is, it isn't far!
Speaking of, the magic you can see is a little weird, more a dozen small bits of it as opposed to what you'd expect from a single monster. However, it is too far dispersed to hint towards a single big swarm type of thing, so when it inevitably comes down to a fight, you may need to cause widespread destruction to get everything you're sensing right now.
Which is just fine with you, of course. Just something to be ready for.
Even as you come closer towards the thingies you can make out from afar, however, you can't help but notice something feels weird. Weird as in wrong weird, rather than normal weird.
Not the kind of weird like 'I think the guy sitting next to me in class might be gay' kind of weird, but rather 'I think this guy might be a serial murderer' kind of weird. Used to be that you'd go out of your way not to ever possibly give anyone that impression, so you know a thing or two about kinds of weirdness.
You usually used Elena as an excuse whenever you had to go murder someone or needed an alibi- being a single dad was hard and you milked it for all it was worth.
Also, is it just you or is there more wind in this park than before? Either the weather's shifting a bit or else it might be this unknown monster's doing.
Idly, you wonder if you should do something about it, but honestly, it's not like you ever get cold anymore… Considering your body temperature is so much lower to begin with whenever you're transformed, you don't really feel any need to bother.
Instead, you stride onwards, proudly ignoring the mild discomfort of the underbrush tickling your-
Waaait a second. How do these lowly plants manage to touch your feet and legs? You have, like, clothes there! Everything up to your thighs should be protected by your thigh highs, at the minimum!
Looking down, you make an annoying discovery. Indeed, you are lacking shoes and leg coverings entirely, but that is not all- your dress is gone as well! Your current lack of clothes would, in fact, explain this state of affairs, you suppose.
Left with naught but your panties, your gloves and the soft ribbon-choker around your neck, you look around, searching for the culprit of this most deplorable theft! And indeed, you spy a ruffle of cloth disappearing behind a tree, your frown and pinched eyebrows surely driving the fear of Jackie into this thief.
…Huh. Now that you're looking, there's more magic signatures matching what you were following earlier all around you. How did you not see these earlier?! They must've been hiding themselves somehow, there's no way you wouldn't have noticed while deep in thought!
The mere idea of you being a scatterbrain is utter heresy and shall be punished by a hundred forceful dickings.
"Come out, come out, wherever you are," you sternly command, crossing your arms over your chest as you are utterly unimpressed with your apparent nakedness. "Before I come find you and stomp you to dust."
With what you can only describe as soundless buzzing, a dozen small humanoids float into sight from behind the trees surrounding you. About the height of a grown man's outstretched hand, they possess green-brown, bark-like skin, with insect-like wings on their backs. Some of them also have an additional pair of wings instead of arms on top, all the while their faces are half-hidden under smooth, wooden helmets covering their eyes.
Also, pointy ears. Your lewdness sensor immediately suggests they may be related to elves somehow.
They start to giggle at you, but don't otherwise answer your challenge, just flying around in a loose circle centered around you.
You clear your throat, not about to slow down for even half a moment. "You have all been very naughty, so I had to come for you."
The little critters surrounding you don't react to your words, even as they come closer on all sides. However, you are much bigger than they are, so you do not particularly care. Not like something this small and puny can ever be a threat to you, after all!
Also, you're willing to bet you got more magic than they do, so screw 'em.
"I don't care what you do, but if you make trouble for people, people notice at some point and that makes you a problem. My problem. So you better-"
You feel a very, very light touch on the back of your knee, locking it in place by tensing your muscles as you look at what just tried to tickle you.
One of the thingies you're trying to lecture right now (for some reason you don't think they're listening all that much, probably just not one of their strengths) has darted towards your leg, swinging its long, flexible tail around itself to use its feathery, soft tip against you, stroking it over your sensitive skin.
"I am not ticklish," you inform it calmly, to agitated sounds of protest from all of the things at once. Turns out they do understand you, or at least you're pretty sure they do.
Of course all that this gets you is all of them homing in on you at once, their tails roaming across your body to try and find a spot that makes you react. However, your armored panties are still well in place, so all you need to do is to keep your arms crossed to protect your nipples in order to remain invulnerable to this feeble attempt at breaking your invincible poise.
"Ptptpt," you declare around the tail swishing across your lips. You don't think you're getting anywhere right now, but you also don't want to give these things the satisfaction of making you stop what you were doing…
Everything these things do, of course, is utterly futile in the face of your infinite magical might. "Ife Ahmoh," you chant, declaring your intention to the world. If you're a bit muffled, well, better just complain to the lil' buggers, one of whom is still trying to shove her tail at your face.
With a swirl of snowflakes that frightens the critters off for a moment, your icy dress materializes, the spell you just cast draping yourself in a fresh new layer of cloth-like cold. Thusly protected, you pointedly exhale from your nose, a thin mist rising from your face until relative temperatures even out again.
"Hmpf," you make, staring down all the small creatures in your field of view. "Futile."
The buggers understand the message for the challenge it is, and launch themselves right back into trying to tickle you as they chitter in what might be a language of some sort… Only to achieve exactly nothing, any contact with your personage blocked off with a thin, yet deceptively strong layer of ice that spontaneously appears any time they try to touch you.
"Mwahahahaha!" You laugh, having completely neutered their attempts at annoying you. "Bow before the might of the Ice Empress!"
They keep on going for a few moments, but even these creatures have to recognize the obvious truth of the situation in short order. More chittering rings out as they regroup, obviously strategizing their next assault- one of the things hits another on the head as they argue, a quick, playful fight almost breaking out among them before they remember you're still standing there, waiting.
In short order, they launch into a sudden bout of synchronized aerial dance, scattering a few bits of powder from their wings as they go. The stuff bursts into colorful lights here and there, accentuating their performance as they, apparently, challenge you to a dance-off or something.
So that's how it's gonna be, is it? They should've realized that you're twice, no, thrice the troublemaker and menace to society, compared to their entire species!
Letting the little creatures finish their challenge in the form of this dance routine, you puff out a huff of misty air, concentrating.
As this challenge has been brought before you, you shall answer it with the full might of Dancing Ice Empress Jackie. None can stand before you, for all shall be danced into the literal ground, in perpetuity, amen!
So you use your ice magic to create a dozen of little miniature versions of yourself out of pure, almost completely transparent ice, keeping them in the air through nothing but the power of your mind (cryokinesis, you mean). You can't really turn them into little mini-golems, because that's actually really hard to do at such small sizes, but you totally can move their limbs with your inherent specialty of and control over ice, so you start off by having them orbit around you.
Just making all of them do the same thing in relation to your own position. Simple, easy and surprisingly mana-efficient. "Very well. Stand back and bear witness… To a much better dancer than all of you together!"
With that, you start dancing, spontaneously devising a simple dance you shall henceforth christen the 'Jackie Step', making your ice dolls repeat your motions as you bear down on your opposition. As you do, you add a few little magical flourishes into it along the way, countering the colorfully bursting powder your challengers emit with little bursts of snowflakes and mist that refracts light to give off rainbow-colored flashes of color yourself.
Truly, none can keep up with your majestic performance! Why, if you were to become an idol, you do not doubt half of humanity, at the very least, would recognize your inherent superiority and crown you the Empress of All That Is in short order!
My dad took over my body to become a young girl and set out on her idol journey? I'm getting the feeling that, somewhere, somehow, that's a light novel title that actually exists.
Humpf. As if you actually would. No, your plans to take over humanity involve a lot more indirect control and potentially some genocide, though gripping the masses' fervor by the balls directly like that would be amusing as well, you'll admit. Alas, you won't become an idol for the time being, for you have other things to do.
Don't underestimate idols. They have to do loads of training, spend most of their time on PR and then they also have to let all the producers and higher-ups rape them… It's a full-time job, and you know very much how exhausting those can be.
At any rate, however, your dancing is impeccable and inimitable, and your audience does seem to agree- they're clapping while making little sounds of amazement, a couple of them darting off to go fetch the stuff they stole from you, even.
You have successfully asserted your dominance amidst the local indigenous tribes, you believe. Mission successful. Or…
What was your mission again? You got so absorbed in dancing while using your magic for stage effects you completely forgot.
Well, nothing in for it. Now all you need to do is to figure out how to get these little guys to stop being an issue for yourself- not, notably, by making them stop playing pranks on people, as such.
Because you have the sneaking suspicion that they probably would ignore any instructions to that end. It's not so much that they have to be migraine-causing menaces to random people and more that it's basically in their nature to be annoying little shits.
The same way it is in your own nature to be better than anyone and anything else. And fuck girls. And cute enough boys.
You've reached an understanding with these pint-sized creatures, is what you're saying. You don't need to exchange words in order to know how they work.
That said, they're also obviously forest-y by nature, as evidenced by their bark skin and Ice Type wings, so you already have an idea as to how to get them out of the way of your 'duties' as a magical girl (more like a pronounced part-time job with extra monsters, murder and sex, really) without just killing them all off. Hey, they're almost, like, kindred spirits, you'd prefer not to just mini-genocide them for a change.
And that's okay with you. You don't always have to murder things. You're secure enough in your masculinity and murderboner-ing that you're perfectly fine with turning other parts of your brain on as well. You're a nuanced, well-balanced individual and shit.
Not some fucking incel that can't figure out why women would rather knife themselves in the pussy than let them score and blames them for their inability to not be a fucking creep. Heck, those particular murders you committed were practically a public service!
But to get back to the little buggers you still need to get out of the way of the potential audit coming for you. "Alright, listen. You guys are in danger if you stay and prank people around here as you have been. Do you like the magic that was left here when you found the place?"
Interpreting two dozen chaotically bustling miniature humanoids scurrying around each other isn't necessarily the easiest thing you've done today, but you think they generally try to express that yes, they do. Discounting all the hair pulling and tail gnawing that's purely for the sake of being contrary to each other, of course.
You did mention you're basically kindred spirits. You recognize what you would do in their position at a glance.
"Mhm. Wanna come to my place? We got a lot more of that there. Just bring everyone and we can have more fun."
Once again, your silver tongue resolves a conflict entirely without bloodshed. You are basically a saint at this point, and anyone that disagrees gets shot until you're officially granted sainthood by the vatican.
Why, you even have the pope hat to prove your legitimacy!
Moving the creatures you decided to recruit into your little army of mischief-makers goes about as well as herding dozens of cats, if those cats could fly, steal random objects from passerby and absolutely refused to be outdone by each other to the point any single one of them flying off means you have to capture the whole herd all over again.
You know, usual cat stuff. That said, at least you find out you can bribe these ones with sweets, and by pretending the chocolate bar you give up was a great sacrifice on your part, you can artificially inflate its value to inspire greater obedience. For about five minutes, but that's all you need to relocate to the Overcity.
And for the record, that chocolate bar is a great sacrifice. You having stockpiled a couple more inside your box for safekeeping after that still elusive thief made off with a bunch of your chocolate harvest a couple days ago doesn't change how much you value each and every bit of chocolate you have.
But sacrifices must be made, and so you make them. In the end you still arrive back home, with your new followers you may need to educate to not steal from your chocolate trees in tow.
Brian, of course, is appropriately awed and defeated as he greets you upon your return. "Chuuh, Jackie, are you chuhing serious?"
"When am I not?" You deadpan at him.
"Puchuuh… Well, Pixie Dust is useful enough to justify letting them stay."
"Would it look bad, audit-wise?"
"Chuuh, I will fudge the books, again, and modify retroactive perception of the forest to make it look like they were there all along, pretend we just went along with them showing up rather than actively resettling them, chuh."
"Mhm…" Honestly, it's actually kind of hard to prepare for an audit when you aren't entirely sure what to expect from it. Brian does seem to pick up on your current line of thinking, as he immediately leaps to explain.
"Puchuh, auditors have great freedom in how they seek to pursue their duties, so the specifics of an active audit depends on who shows up to perform it. Knowing who may be sent, chuh, and how to deal with them is half the battle… And I happen to have found out through thorough analysis of the office schedule, chuuh, recent audits and knowledge of how the responsible bureaucracy works."
Well, seeing as you have exactly zero doubts about the reason for this whole shebang, that being the general resentment literally all of Brian's past coworkers feel for him, you suppose it's good he's at least pulling just enough weight to try and make up for some of his culpability in all of this extra work you have to do.
And yes, you know he knows that you know. His tail just twitched when you thought about how he's to blame for everything.
"Chuh, we will have to deal with the Collector," Brian tells you, the capitalized word obviously some kind of name. "Which is both good and bad, chuh, in that it does not matter much how many violations against regulation it will find."
"Sloppy?" You ask, tilting your head.
"Chu-uh," your mascot denies in short order, shaking his head. "Arbitrary, chuh. The Collector will pretend to be reasonable, but then proceed to chuh around rapidly. It will find fault where there is none and ignore actual violations of regulation and policy both, puchuh, so while disguising such things keeps them out of it report, it is not the highest priority when dealing with it."
"Okay." You aren't the expert here, so you can hardly gainsay Brian on this. Also, you don't really care all that much about the details, only about how you'll deal with this Collector figure. "What do we do?"
"Chuuh, it values and cherishes drama, magical girls, dramatical magical girl activities and everything associated with such. It will also send a plethora of minions to do its dirty work. Intercepting and defeating them will be the key to minimizing unnecessary exposure of secrets we want to keep hidden."
"So whip the B Team into a frenzy and obliterate the trash as it comes out," you nod.
"Chuuh… It is named the Collector for its habit to collect magical girls. Most are unhanded after it leaves, as per its employment contract, chuh, but it does keep a variety of alternatives on hand as well to use as aforementioned minions."
You hold up a hand. "Are you saying to expect those antimagic prototypes you made?" You ask, remembering that robotic abomination that blew up right on top of you and majorly pissed you off for days.
"Not quite, puchuh, thankfully. That said, magical androids meant to imitate them, magical monsters or past arch-enemies of weaker girls it picked up are all possible, chuh, depending on what it decides would be the most fittingly dramatic."
"That sounds like a massive pain in the ass," you point out with full and complete honesty.
"It is, puchuh, but at least it means we have free reign otherwise, just as long as the Collector is satisfied with your performance."
"That sounds suspiciously like you're putting your faith into me."
"Chuuh, there is nothing you cannot achieve when you put your mind to it," Brian says, completely monotonous, as though reading it from a page and obviously not personally invested. "I believe in you, puchuh, and the 'insert dreams and ideals here' you pursue."
You blink. "Did you seriously just say that."
"Quoted verbatim from the manual, chuh."
"…I miss the times you were a distrustful, obstructionist little piece of shit. At least you were too busy to develop any snark."
All things said and done, the exact nature of your preparations for the big audit does, as Brian purported, depend on the nature of your auditor. Now that you have a general idea of what you're dealing with, you have to decide what to do to best stand against the auditorial vagaries you shall have to endure.
Seriously, there's a reason nobody likes audits. They suck on every organizational level wherever they or something similar are brought to bear.
So. The Collector, as Brian tells you, isn't really any great direct issue, and will instead be a lot more of a 'soft' test of your capabilities; as long as you can keep it and any creatures it summons from actually seeing anything incriminating, you should be good.
The challenge, then, would be to… actually ensure as much, obviously. Yes, you are great and mightyful, but even so you can hardly be in all too many places at once.
Which is kind of an issue when you expect the Collector to throw its weight around all over the 'real' city of bandar generik. Primarily in regards to the device that maintains and siphons power from that one demonic lust field you've still got going… Or the part of the city that's still being rebuilt as you speak.
Because someone just had to burn it down. Like a big old Kerrie. You aren't naming names, but if there was someone named Kerrie, she'd be your first suspect.
But apparently, even that would be enough to have the Collector… complicate things for you, according to Brian. Which is annoying. On the other hand, if there's one thing you don't lack it is cheap helping hands to call on at any time.
Using your small army of monsters and stuff would probably be counter-productive this time around, unless you can somehow turn it into something that fits the classical magical girl archetype somehow. Sadly, you doubt you can successfully pretend a couple dozen imps ripping each other apart half the time was covered under the whole power of unlikely friendship deal.
So you'll have to actually make use of your magical girl subordinates… And effective use, at that. And also trust your home defenses to do their thing, in case your HQ comes under attack. Which, again, is entirely possible going by past examples of the Collector's work.
All said and done, though, you're actually quite confident in this whole thing. You've got the power, the manpower and the aces up your sleeve to win this audit through force, you feel.
A couple of minor last-minute preparations couldn't hurt, of course, but there's only so much you can do to add to perfection, see?
One of those very, very few things you can do is to ensure that the one really irreplaceable (in the sense that replacing it would be extremely expensive, problematic, kind of dangerous and also probably unethical, not that anyone really cares) asset you've got lying around in Generikstadt won't be what you'd describe as a 'soft target'.
You are of course referring to the possibly illegal, but definitely profitable machine that filters the demonic lust field still sustained over an area of downtown into magical essence for your use. The thing may just land you in hot water in case it's discovered and written up on your HR profile.
That said, you also don't want to lose out on its uses… And you can't exactly just, like, shut it down temporarily, as Brian explained it, because once you take the magical field off the device he built it'll just shrink down massively as a sort of 'rebound' effect, seeing as the machine is what's keepin it sustained in a self-reinforcing loop the way you'd normally need the field's creator to do.
And actually summoning a demon capable of making a replacement would be… annoying. Like, you could theoretically do it, but calling up actually powerful demons can be a testy proposition at the best of times. And sure, you could just have the Anal Demon do it again, seeing as she's the one that created this field in the first place, but…
Well, she's kind of weak, even if you were to take her out of her current host body and unleash her full strength. Apparently, creating a field like the one you've been making use of is actually fairly simple and even easy for most demons above a certain level of personal strength, but those are usually extremely small and weak for a long-ass time as they build them up from there.
Just reaching the current size of yours apparently took Anal Demon months of dragging impressionable mortals into that apartment at the core of it, the same one where your machine now stands, to keep a perpetual orgy going that fueled the field's expansion.
And you aren't going to lose fucking months of production over this shit. No way, no how. You may not be a drug lord as such (…note to self, look into whether raw magical essence can be turned into drugs or something, this has potential), but the same principle applies, dammit!
Hence how you end up overseeing Brian as he deftly wields a welding tool, his plush face protected by the appropriate, OSHA-mandated welding mask that is somehow staying in place there. "How long is this gonna take?" You ask over the noise of the tools held in his paws.
"Chuuh, however long it takes, Chuhackie. Getting these magically non-conductive materials wasn't easy, chuh, I'm not about to waste them by half-chuhing it."
You grumble to yourself, but otherwise continue keeping watch just in case.
Working a hotel reception was an… interesting job, one that beat being the concierge or having to do inventory and order in replacements, refills and more any day. Sadly, as a simple employee you didn't always get to choose what you ended up doing, but Lauren was decent enough with people and didn't mind just sitting there all day dealing with them, so it was mostly agreed upon that she did so.
Unless some other stuff needed doing and there weren't enough people qualified to do it, but that was life as hotel staff. Also, making newbies sit on her chair to deal with the guests never ceased to be amusing in itself, either.
It wasn't retail, but it could come close, depending on the kinds of customers they had.
That said, it was evening by now, so Lauren was looking forward to waiting out her shift, closing everything off and going home to watch Netflix, eat unhealthy amounts of ice cream (she'd worry about the pounds on the weekend, as always) and think about getting a cat already, because she knew she was lonely and going to become a crazy cat woman in her old age anyways.
…Not that she was getting old. On the contrary, eternal seventeen, that was her! No getting thirty and realizing she had wrinkles for her, no thanks!
Hahahahahahahahahahaha- Actually, the whole 'woman going mad over losing her beauty' cliche in movies and stuff was making an alarming amount of sense sometimes.
Idly watching some random video on her reception screen (with the sound off, of course, she was a professional receptionist), she-
The doors to the hotel lobby opened, a… man? Woman? No, he was a man, she was sure now, came inside, carrying a briefcase in one hand. A tall, slender person, clad in a suit perfectly tailored to his easily six and a half feet frame; yeah, this man was the kind of clientele they always liked to see here.
Now why in the world was he here so late in the evening?
"Hello hello hello there," he said, far too enthusiastic for this time of day. "I would like to inquire as to the opening of rooms in this here fine establishment!"
"Uh, one moment please." Obviously the eccentric type, but as long as he didn't pull a gun on her, Lauren was going to do her job. Clicking away what she'd been doing, she looked through the hotel's bookings. "Sorry, it looks like our last open room was just booked twenty min-"
"Oh no, that won't do, not at all." The man(?) tapped his finger on the reception desk. "Try again for better results!"
"I'm sorry, sir, but-" Lauren blinked, somehow seeing the hotel's software updating to let her know of a change in real time. "Well I'll be."
"Always attempt hope, hope! You never know when it helps! Now then, I require accommodations for up to several days, work-related reasons! Your understanding is understood and appreciated."
"…Ssssure, got it. We have an opening for three days, the breakfast buffet is open until ten?"
"Much much much appreciated indeed! Now I have to excuse myself, for I am mightily tired after traveling through traffic for so long. Why, the streets are murder today!"
With that, he marched off, the key to his room danglin from one of his how many arms even though Lauren hadn't given it to him yet.
"You know what, I won't even question any of that," she decided aloud.
And if she tried her hand at hoping for a cute boy ten years her junior to hook up with in the next couple of days, well, hope was free, wasn't it?
Number of people that cannot remember that tall person's face: 28
Number of mentally scarred victims: 3
Casualties: 0
You awaken from your fitful slumber with a sudden, startling twitch, snapping awake despite the blissful line of congealed saliva stuck to the corner of your mouth.
It isn't the only thing stuck there, as a quick probe confirms that all the chocolate fruit you ate yesterday evening left traces on your face as well. The miraculous produce you have gained access to is delicious when eaten raw, quite like different brands of store-bought chocolate somehow despite presumably not containing any milk (then again, magical plants, what do you know), but they also can be prepared in various ways to take on entirely new variants of chocolate-y goodness.
Hot chocolate, by the cupfuls, diced chocolate mixed between different fruits, chocolate soufflé and chocolate sorbet produced through your own magic, chocolate straws made to suck up soft drinks and then be eaten and even chocolate ice cream Chuckie made with them, because she knows how to make homemade ice cream and it is glorious.
You burp as you rub your belly, residual chocolate fumes filling your senses with happiness.
Struggling off your bed, your slightly swollen midsection making you a fraction less agile than usual, but your elegant, swan-like and not at all chubby legs make contact with the round somewhere outside your hill of bedding just fine after just a little bit of trying.
A day that begins on the dead, discarded body of another day filled with chocolate consumption can only be a great day. There is no other possibility. Nothing could possibly ruin it from this point.
Except, as you open the door to your room to let a yawning Tabitha sleepily totter out for her morning kibbles, you are confronted with the sight of Brian, who for some reason is currently floating in the air.
"Puchuuh, the Collector is in town! The audit, chuh! It is motivated, there have been casualties already, chuuh!"
"…I need more chocolate to deal with this shit."
-Are you guys hunkered up?
-wish I had sm hunks
-none of thes chicks got dicks 4 me
-Why are you the only one replaying?
-Bubbles?
-other three are playing game
-not even watching news
-Better than running around
-Got confirmation big boy is in town
-talkin big dick
-??
-or big nope
-Gonna say nope
-Just a feeling
-figres
-news say big traffic thing offed people
-guess no bad boy 4 me
-Pretty sure they got no gender
-Or, like, all the genders
-gotcha
-shame, coulda be hot
-also, when u gon stop typing like a grandma?
-Grammatical correctness is not an old people thing
-Now cease your lies and make sure those three stay distracted
-roger roger
-we waitn 4 somethng
-?
-Need to finish breakfast
-Can't fight on an empty stomach
-oh nice
-what u havin?
-Chocolate Cake
-[IMG]
-not loadin
-One second
Once your belly's filled up with more chocolate goodness (and Chuckie made you eat some fried eggs and toast on top to make for what she calls an 'actual breakfast'), you feel a lot better about going out and being a big damn hero, as usual. Really, what would this city do without you?
…Well, it probably would keep on going somehow, but it would be a lot more of a shithole in all likelihood, covered is monsters and suffering. Which wouldn't actually bother yourself all that much, there's a reason you don't live in the actual city and literally went so far as to move to a parallel reality to keep your distance, but practically speaking you actually do want to keep the place more or less intact.
Y'know, without having to murder half the inhabitants on the regular because a couple monsters decided to breed to much and you have regular goblin infestations to deal with or something.
Anyways, you have an audit to overcome, and the process apparently involves clearing up some traffic. "Okay," you declare, snatching Brian from the air beside you where he's still floating around for some reason, "now I'm ready. What do we have to deal with?"
"Chuuh, giant boars are interrupting traffic all over the city."
You stare at Brian. Brian, held in your hands, stares back at you, his one intact plush eye entirely emotionless.
"Come again?"
"Puchuh, the Collector is notoriously flighty and eccentric. Do not be surprised at whatever creatures it uses against us."
You sigh, shoving him under your arm as you make to leave your home, your magical costume hugging your form as your tights-clad legs work to eat the distance between yourself and the nearest portal between the city and the Overcity. "It's stupid is what it is."
"As I/we said, the traffic is murder," the Collector pondered, watching the chaos unfold below its perch on the roof of one of the highest, notably anonymous buildings of this nameless city.
"But where are the valiant heroes out to save the day?" The Collector questioned, waving its hand, irritated.
"Doing as they should," the Collector reasoned in response. "Heroes only show up at the last moment!"
"They could still hurry/hurry…/hurry!" Impatiently twirling its fingers around inside their sockets, the Collector glared at the street below, the clickety-clacking sound soothing its nerves.
"Would you like another coffee, sir?" Snapping out of its soliloquy, the Collector put on a smiling face for the waitress here at this café, the top of the nameless hotel having been converted accordingly some time after the city's name was found absent.
"Why, yes/surely/positive! Another coffee/hot brew/bean soup would be lovely!" The Collector beamed at her, evaluating the woman's face. Sadly, while it was aesthetically pleasing, its employment contract prevented it from permanently obtaining human selves for its own use, so it would have to keep admiring it from the outside for the moment. "And some of the apple cake as well, if you would."
"Of course." Lush, expressive lips smiled at it as the waitress nodded, disregarding the people leaning onto the glass walls keeping them from falling to their deaths to take pictures of the chaos on street level.
Now to see whether the heroes of the hour made it in time for it to finish the apple cake, or if it would consume the apple strudel before such happened. Tick, tock, tick, tock.
Organizing a resistance to the… porcine invaders to the fair city of Generica while you yourself are preoccupied otherwise takes a mere handful of moments; the agent you have imbedded inside of the local magical girl community is eager enough to respond to your prodding, and while you wouldn't put it beyond the B-Team to 'accidentally' burn down a couple of buildings, if that means you can roast the boars over the flames, you're fine with that.
You make your way through the city's airspace in order to try and find some semblance of method to the madness currently enveloping the streets. True to Brian's report, enormous boars are currently rampaging all over the place, enormous, monstrous animals large enough to take up two lanes each with dark, obviously thick skin, mouths that can swallow and crunch up half a car and enough speed to do so repeatedly even as anyone that encounters them runs or drives away like hell.
Interestingly, you don't see any blood down there, at least in the areas you fly over in your haphazard search. Just a lot of screaming and roaring from the pigs, screaming from the fleeing civilians and a small police barricade where two police cars were parked facing each other to try and block off a street, the accompanying policemen and -women pelting one of those pigs with bullets.
A few of them even penetrate, rather than getting stuck in the thick skin or bouncing off outright. The giant boar currently charging at them doesn't particularly seem to notice, however, and just when you think you're about to see a massacre to keep things entertaining-
A gale of wind blows dramatically, heralding the arrival of the backup you sent to deal with this. Jumping in front of the police officers with a classical three point landing straight from a comic book, Kerrie grabs her sword still in its sheathe, drawing it in one smooth motion as she stands. In doing so, she focuses her magic as visible to your senses, culminating in a thin line of fire drawn by the tip of her weeb-sword.
The boar attacking the police officers squeals in pain as its head is split apart by the projected fire slash, its momentum keeping it going in the middle of dying until it skids to a halt a few feet in front of her.
"Are you alright? If so, make sure to evacuate everyone you can!" She calls out, not waiting for a response from the police people she just saved as she runs forwards, straight into the fray.
While that's going on, the other three magical girls you sent out for this also showed up, presumably having split up to cover more ground and act quicker in light of the situation at hand.
Bubbles is sitting astride one of these giant monster pigs, a simple harness made of dimly glowing rope in one hand as she laughs and basically sends her steed slamming into any of its nearby conspecifics with full force, whereas Olivia jumps onto one of them at a time, ramming her twin spears into them to pull their heads around, making them swerve away from anyone they might hurt before jumping off up on a nearby roof again, looking for the next fire she needs to put out.
You see one boar that bears a bunch of stab wounds, but it doesn't seem particularly impaired by them; at a guess, she probably just failed to do appreciable damage and decided to run interference instead. Uncommonly smart, given her Olivia level of intelligence.
Mitsuko, on the other hand…
Well, there's a couple of dimly rainbow-colored magical barriers blocking off a couple of streets, somewhat limiting the spread of the boar plague you're faced with here. The girl herself, though, is currently facing off against another fresh boar, a pair of barriers to both of it sides forcing it to go into one direction and one direction only.
Straight at the pink-haired girl in question. Who is grinning widely as the monster pig in question is charging right at her, the very ground shaking under its weight.
"Wait for iiiit," she calls out, fingering her weapon, "wait for iiiiiiit… HA-YAAAAAAAAH!"
If you thought Kerrie striking one of these things down with a precise strike using her magic was impressive, Mitsuko is currently being… Well, more than that. Stepping forward right into the boar's path, she swings her giant-ass weapon down in a straight line, the buzzsaw forcefield end of it meeting the monster head-on.
A second or two later, only taking as long due to all the meat, bone and gristle she ha to go through, she re-emerges on its tail end, having completely split the giant boar in twain, right along the line of its spine- no, at a slight angle, as you see now.
The blood and gore doesn't so much as splatter as it explodes all over the place, the literal meatgrinder of a girl covered in it from head to toe. Seemingly unbothered, she just laughs and proceeds to do much as Kerrie did, hunting down more of the creatures making a mess of your front yard with great haste and enthusiasm.
You know, she may be a little over-enthusiastic, actually. Just a little.
At any rate, you move right onward, assuming that the originator of all this senseless chaos and destruction might be nearby to watch it unfold- if you were an auditor, where would you be?
When in doubt, go find the highest point of reference in sight and go from there. Once you've figured out possible locations for the Collector to be hiding, you can-
Just as you stop your ice platform right next to the tallest building in immediate sight, you happen to spy a creature casually sitting on a rooftop terrace, of sorts, a spindly, slender form with three pairs of arms poking out of itself around shoulder height, over half a dozen doll-like faces squirming on a slimy, black clump jutting out where its head should be. Its skin ranges from black to blue to red to chitin, a glowing red pulsing thing stuck at the top of its open ribcage.
Its proportions are, all in all, completely wrong, not so much hitting the uncanny valley as it declares it to be its postal code. It also is wearing a colorful band of large beads around its neck, even as bone-like protrusions sprout from its back, decorated with chains.
It also is currently using four of its arms to drink a cup of coffee (yuck) with one doll-face, eat a piece of cake (yum) with another face, its third pair drumming all ten fingers on the table it is casually sitting at as though it fit into this café, its entire body shifting and giving off a black mist that disperses as soon as it leaves its body.
Oh yeah, also also, it's currently facing you, all but the two faces busy with that looking at you. "Hello/Hello?/Hello there!" It greets you in five different voices, male and female, young and old, all babbling on at once. "Would you like to join us for a bite, Magical Girl Ice Empress/Valued Employee/Scrumptios Morsel?"
Now that's not creepy nor concerning at all.
Clearly, there can only be one answer for you to give to such an inquiry, it doesn't even need any thought. "[CAKE," you declare, forcing reality to bend its knee and produce the delicious foodstuff you crave with such intensity it cannot help but follow your command
"Fine," you agree, "but you're paying."
"Ohoho, of course/naturally/insolence!" The creature apparently commonly known as the Collector (you don't want to assume or anything, but from a narrative perspective it would be beyond weird if this was anyone else) waves you closer, so you go ahead and hop off your platform, joining him in short order.
Now, you figure that before whatever else is about to happen, you should at the very least talk shop beforehand. "What do they got here?"
"Why, I was about to order the apple strudel, though I also have been smitten by the sight of their cinnamon rolls/strawberry cake/disgusting baked goods," the creature informs you.
You tilt your head. "Is voice number three always contrarian or…?"
"My apologies/apologies/shut it, she just never enjoyed these kinds of things," the Collector waves it off, 'head' rotating so another set of faces faces you. "Why/why/why, we should work through the entire menu, it is the only way we can make up our mind/decide/prioritize!"
"I can sympathize with that," you nod, blinking momentarily when you see Brian look at you with the closest approximation of horror you've ever seen from him; you'd kinda forgotten he was even present, to be honest. Nevertheless, you raise your hand for the waitress.
There's a concept you never really knew about until you merged with Elena, and you're pretty sure it was fictional to begin with, but still- as a girl, you have a fifth-dimensional stomach for sweets, and you intend to fill this tesseract up at every opportunity and excuse that presents itself.
Long story short, the strudel is pretty decent, though you kind of miss the nippy, fragrant aroma of those Viridian fruits you eat all the time nowadays. It does make up for that with plenty of sugar, though.
And the chocolate sauce is a nice touch, too. You ain't gonna lie.
"So, while we eat/consume/indulge in gluttony," the Collector speaks up shortly after your order arrives, "shall we discuss the challenges/trials/terms of surrender ahead?"
"I do not surrender," you inform him with ice in your voice and on your face, before you return to spearing up a chunk of the really pretty good sweet you were presented with on your fork. "But sure, lay it on me."
"Very good/wonderful/must we?" Ah, number three is back again- she, apparently, quietly nudged her way across the Collector's excuse for a cranial apparatus and is staring at you again. You think. "Now, the strength of the local magical girls is provably immense/wonderful/obvious, but we all know the task requires more than sheer strength, yes?"
"Mhm," you agree, without adding too many specifics on what you agree with. Certainly, you also have to be resourceful, make use of more than just your own strength and handle a whole team you have to string along, keep Brian from going completely mad on you when you just got him to cooperate, manage your own home and household…
And provide the correct type and amount of drama to leverage the narrative that seems to be the constant undercurrent of reality as far as you're concerned, you'll admit it.
"So the question/puzzle/murdertime," the Collector exclaims, says and breathily moans, in that order, only to reach a hand into its head, pushing one face inside of it only for another one to resurface elsewhere as they all shift to make up for the space, "is one beyond such trifling things. However, it would not be adequate/fair/sensible to abruptly change the parameters of the testing/challenge/sudden swine, now would it?"
"Mhm," you continue nodding along, resisting the urge to just 'muh' at this thing. Even though you have this feeling the Collector would get what you mean you just fine- call it an understanding between kindred souls.
Steepling all six of its hands, the auditor stops its constant fidgeting more a moment. "I shall give you a choice, as you were the first to find me/figure it out/win at hide-and-seek. I shall give you a test of character/mindset, teamwork/cohesion/loyalty or else an adequately great enemy/challenge/utter madness. Choose!"
…Why do you get the feeling you aren't being told everything here? Then again, it's not like the Collector is being subtle about that.
Huffing, you cross your arms. "I'm obviously the best, so no test of character could ever stop me," you declare, utterly convinced in your ability to best whatever the Collector throws at you.
In the periphery of your eyesight, Brian holds a plush paw over his face, hiding his one good eye. Whatever is he on about no-
All of a sudden, you are not so confident anymore. In fact, you lose your confidence entirely; obviously, everything about this was a terrible idea. You shouldn't have decided anything, and in fact you shouldn't even be here, every part of this situation is utterly, inherently wrong.
You don't have what it takes to be a magical girl. You barely even have what it takes to be more than an amoeba wobbling around inside your bedroom until it starves to death as horribly as it deserves. You don't have the right to make any important decisions, because you'll inevitably screw it up.
You'll just screw it all up, because that's all you ever do. Your entire existence is the culmination of successive failure, and you know it. You shouldn't ever have let Elena make the choices she had to after you died like an idiot, you shouldn't ever have come to this city in the first place, you shouldn't ever have treated people the way you did-
Oh God, you're a horrible person!
Daddy! Daddy, stop, halt, you're under some mental influence! I can't purge it, but hold on!
Right. Right, Elena is still there, stuck inside your head because you still haven't found a way to bring her back to life or to give her body back or anything! You're a terrible father on top of everything else!
"Why, you seem quite rattled/disturbed/fucked in the head!" The Collector notes and crows, respectively, as one of its faces eats another bite of cake. Cake which is too good for you. You should throw it all up and apologize to it right away…
But wait, that's right. "What did you do?" You ask, your words coming out entirely unlike you can ever remember; not forceful nor disaffected and bored, but rather with a slight tremble, soft, vulnerable, your eyes even a little teary as you look up at the creature that did this to you.
In contrast to your utter fearlessness you only now notice is not necessarily a given in all cases, you are… afraid. Why did you ever come anywhere close to something this scary of your own free will? This monster is terrifying, both because of how strong it is and because of the obvious implications of its many faces. You doubt it was just born with them somehow, it obviously stole a whole bunch of identities of other people and has been using them ever since.
"Why, naught but give you what you wanted/asked for/deserve!" Snapping the fingers of one of its hands, the Collector leans closer towards you, making you cower up from the sheer proximity to this thing, and begins to stage-whisper. "After all, what better way to measure one's character than by letting another give it a spin/switch it in/take it on the chin?"
Oh God. Oh God. Oh God. "Someone else has my personality and I have theirs?"
That explains a lot. Where are the fireworks, though?
"Why yes/absolutely/indeed-y! The Green One was the other recipient in this exchange- only appropriate, she kept thinking of you, after all!"
Oh no. Oh no. Oh no.
"Puchuuh," Brian says, speaking up for the first time ever since you first found the Collector, "that is a recipe for horrible disaster, you are aware."
You can't- you have to do something! But anything you do will only make everything worse! What do you do? What can you do?! Aaaaaaaaaaaa-
No! No, you have to focus, keep a clear head! It doesn't matter if the way you're thinking is all wrong, you are still yourself and you refuse to let that be made into a lie now!
Even if it's mostly lip service right now, you have to ignore that and push through. This isn't the first time you suddenly found the contents of your character changing rapidly to begin with, so you even have experience with this sort of thing!
You think back, back to times before Jackie, before you were one with Elena. Long before any of that happened, you were Jack, Jack Winters, and the lifetime of experience you have as him is what you draw upon now.
Even if you still can't remember half of it, admittedly. You can't let that stop you, though.
Focus! You are the Winters, you are the ice! You are not afraid! Fear is a stranger to you! It shall eat poop while you go out there and be a big girl!
…A part of you can't help but wonder if this is how Olivia usually functions, having to hype herself up to gather up the resolve she needs to do literally anything. And as you do, your thoughts inevitably move towards introspection of the way you now think about your life…
Why did she ever leave you? What did-
Okay, it's been funny so far, but enough is enough! Elena's voice, clear and forceful like a brick made of ice to the face, cuts through your brain. That cunt can go fuck off, she abandoned us and she gets exactly as much mental real estate as she deserves, zero! Nada! Zilch!
That's probably right, but…
Oh, crap, you forgot! Stupid Jackie! You have to get yourself under control, else you won't ever manage to…
Actually, you should probably clear this up. "Excuse me?" You ask, raising your hand for the Collector to notice. "What exactly is the purpose of this test, and how do I pass it?"
"Why, a good/great/marvelous question! The point, my dear, is to grant insight into a facet of the subject's character, from a new and differing perspective/point of view/vantage, like switching samples between microscopes! And truly, it has show results- who would have known there was such courage inside the Green Girl's heart?"
You tilt your head, thinking of Olivia… and yourself, right now. "I don't feel very courageous," you point out, fighting the urge to pull your feet up on your chair so you can hug your knees. There may still be some tears in your eyes.
"And yet still, you spoke up when you determined it was what you had to do, regardless of how you felt. Why, I could sense such panic/trepidation/damn snowflake in you, I doubted you would ever budge again, yet you still did it!" The Collector twitches, its faces all angling to properly look at you, making you feel uncomfortable. "And what is courage, if not overcoming fear/doing it anyway/having balls?"
You don't cry. You totally don't. You can't.
"As for how to pass the test… You cannot very well do so, now, can you?" The creature talking to you casually gestures outwards, downwards- you completely forgot, but there's still monsters about, down there, and so are the others! "The Green One has to. She has the character being tested in you."
…If nothing else, at least Olivia can't screw up as horribly as you would? Though, you are feeling what she normally would, she'll be just as bad as you are, won't she?
"Haaaaaahahahahahahaha! Kneel before me, inferior worms!" Soaring high in the air, Olivia charged her wind energy up by letting her twin lances twirl, the rush of the speed at which she was moving just enough to let her feel alive. "Too slow! Too weak! Suffer and die, foreveeer! Olivia Meteor!"
Impacting the last of the boars from straight above, she caused its flesh to ripple under the force of her impact, her mighty weapons sparking as she drove them into the back of its skull, reaching the brain in a flash thanks to the added inertia.
Physics classes, bitches! They were actually useful for murdering big-ass monsters.
"Phew!" She had no idea why she was feeling this… great? Silently confident? Like nothing could possibly get her down? All of a sudden, but she wasn't gonna question it either. "All in a day's work, guess. Ugh, now my shoes are all icky, though…"
Turned out she couldn't help but get dirty from all the blood spilling out of the giant carcass she was now standing on. Ah well, whatever. She'd deal with that later.
"C'mon, c'mooon, get out already…" Pulling her spears out again was a much more difficult chore, by contrast, even when she pulled on only a single one with both hands, her legs pushing against the slippery carcass. "Grrr! Come… Ouooo-!"
…She totally didn't completely slip, fall off, jump back onto the offending corpse and kick her spear a time or two before she managed it. Clearly.
Rubbing her butt nevertheless, Olivia grumbled to herself as she made sure nobody was around to film that whole episode. Luckily, all the civilians in sight had already been evacuated, so that was one load off her back!
The Collector chuckles as it watches Olivia's antics, though you certainly don't- you're secondhand mortified by how embarrassing they are, really, and so you barely even notice when, after a moment of thought, the abomination sitting next to you (and a shudder goes through you at the thought still) raises all six hands.
When it snaps with all of them at once, though, you definitely do notice, your head snapping around at the sudden sound. Similarly, you immediately note the way the shadows surrounding you start to twist and deepen, becoming somehow darker than they should be.
You don't want to, but you have to ask. "What's that?"
"Oh, leaving things as they are would be boring/inconsequential/useless useless useless! Wouldn't it? So now they're being spiced up."
Something wriggles in the darkness, but it doesn't come out, instead floating onward, somehow, out of sight. Even so you can clearly see the flow of magical power emanating from the Collector, a great current of energy used for some obscure purpose.
"On hand number three, though, there is nothing keeping you here/in the vicinity/within reach," the thing posing as a real being acting as your auditor points out, inspecting its sharp, claw-like fingernails. On all hands at once, using its abundance of faces devoid of emotion. "If you cared to, you could hurry to the aid/rescue/last minute heroic entrance of your allies."
And leave the Collector unsupervised in the meantime, doing who-knows-what? On the other hand… surely they might need your help, if it points this out as bluntly like that?
You bite your lip.
When Jackie had let them know to prepare for today, everyone had known something bad was going to happen. After all, their white-haired fellow magical girl usually didn't bother booking a timeslot ahead of time, instead just calling them to wherever she wanted some backup, so this change in behavior was… worrying, to say the least.
Worrying enough Kerrie had her parents call her in sick to school before they went to work, and she knew Olivia had done the same. Magical Delinquent Girls, such was them. They couldn't even deny it anymore.
Mitsuko, the Japanese girl Jackie had found somewhere, was with them as well, having been introduced to their secret hideout (or afterschool clubhouse, depending on how one viewed it) and playing around with them when the call came.
And what a call it was. Of all the things Kerrie had been expecting that day to bear, giant boars interrupting traffic all over the place had not been it.
That said, they could deal with that, even if the whole occurrence was downright abnormally strange- how did two dozen hogs the size of a school bus each just appear like that in the middle of a city?- while ensuring the area was evacuated, thanks to the police helping them out a little.
Of course not everyone was gone, but there was no traffic, neither by car nor pedestrians, for them to worry about, which had been massively helpful in letting them focus on defeating the monsters.
Reconvening after the attack, Kerrie took a quick stock of how everyone was doing- she herself had used up quite a bit of magic, but she was still good to go, Bubbles probably needed to recover a little longer from having expended so much of her magical energy, Mitsuko was… Covered with gore from head to toe, but otherwise unhurt and in fighting condition, whereas Olivia…
To be honest, Kerrie was worried about Olivia. Rightfully so, she believed.
"I wanna eat their meat, guys! Boars are supposed to taste really good, so how about we roast them over Kerrie's fire or something, with some salt and pepper and stuff?"
"I would… not be opposed, I think?" Mitsuko replied, doing the one thing none of them should do- encouraging her. "Wild boar is said to be quite delicious in Japan, but I never did have any."
"Wait wait wait, before any of that," Bubbles barrelled into the conversation, holding out a fishnet glove-clad hand. "Ollie, you're looking, like, a little different today. You had some great sleep or what?"
"Hmm… I think fighting just agrees with me. I've been feeling pretty great for a while now." She wasn't slouching and actually kept eye contact with everyone, which, hey, great for her, but… Why did Olivia also keep on subtly holding out her weapons at everyone? "It helps just how much better I am than everyone else. I'm a dang shooting star compared to how you guys are, yo!"
…Oh great. "Oliv- Magical Girl Truth Seeker, please keep in mind that you are very, very not cool enough to say 'yo'," Kerrie cringed. "It's just painful."
"Yeah, sorry sister, but she's, like, totes right there," Bubbles agreed.
"You guys just don't get it," Olivia seethed, crossing her arms (and her spears with them). "You see if I bother with you at all instead of just doing everything myself from now on. Pleh."
And she literally stuck her tongue out at them. Each and every step of this conversation felt utterly… out of place, considering what she knew about Olivia- they'd been friends for a while now, and this sudden change of attitude really, really had Kerrie worried.
"Okay, Naked Night, Dazzling Destruction, let's detain Truth Seeker for now," she decided. "She's obviously compromised somehow- someone or something must have messed with her head, we just don't know how. We'll find out once she's no longer a threat to herself or others."
"Wait, what?!"
"Oh my." Mitsuko tilted her head demurely. "So it was not an act, after all?"
"Grabby time!"
"Hey! Leggo Bubbles- what'd I do to you, huh?!"
"Nothing, I just wanna feel ya up!"
"Dammit, my meat grill betrayed meee!"
Of course, that was right when they all noticed, stiffening where they stood. Regardless of the way Bubbles' hands were currently forcing their way under Olivia's clothes.
For some reason, the air felt almost cloying all of a sudden, and the shadows cast by the sun's rays hitting the buildings around them (only some of which bore boar impact craters) were much darker than they had been moments ago.
Then their own shadows started to move, climbing up out of the ground, and dozens more humanoid shadow-creatures began showing up, shuffling towards them like a mix between horror movie zombies and some creepy-pasta nonsense.
"Okay, is it just me or is today one of, like, those days?" Bubbles asked, looking around to confirm what Kerrie already knew- they were surrounded. And while these shadow-zombies were completely silent by themselves, they still loudly crashed into things and through glass, literally throwing themselves out of windows to smash down onto the street in hopes of getting at them.
"Think it might not just be you," Kerrie murmured, eyeing Olivia. If she couldn't be trusted…
"I'm fine, I'm telling you," the green-ette groaned, spears held out in a fighting stance. "Bring it on, ya suckers!"
"Language," Mitsuko chided her, conjuring a large wall of iridescent light to one side of the street from their position. "This should hold them back, but I suggest we-"
Next thing anyone knew, a woman made of ice, carrying a large sword, came flying from above, landing not too far from them; the dust thrown up by her impact lasted for a long moment until Olivia called up a stiff breeze to blow it away.
The elegant features and dress (was that a kimono?) belied the force with which the beautiful, living ice sculpture had just entered the scene. "This whole place is crawling with movement. Come with me if you want to live."
Olivia held up a hand. "Wait a sec, is that a Terminator reference?"
Golden flashes of light began to rain down all over the area, showing themselves to be thin, downright fragile short golden spears coming down by the dozens just of what they could see. A large amount failed to hit anything, but any of the shadow-things struck by one were immobilized, writhing in pain just as silently as they did anything else.
"Yup. Definitely one of those days."
It's not easy to provide long-range sniping support at these ranges while also keeping an eye on the Collector, but you do the best you can under these circumstances; your guns turned into their cross form, you're launching one golden spear after another, coordinating with Elena to directly observe where you're hitting and how to adjust your aim.
That still makes it… very not easy to actually hit, but every now and then you manage. Meanwhile, though, you also have to actually deal with the source of this new problem as well- as it turns out, those shadow-things the Collector is summoning are immune to normal attacks, ignoring even the magic of the girls down on the ground entirely.
The only effective method of dealing with them are your spears, or rather the 'elemental' effect on them, which happens to be lots of holy damage. That's a very specific thing for them to be affected by, and so you're glaring at the creature still summoning more of them out of the shadows of any living people in the entire district.
"Stop that," you command, or try at least; your voice just isn't firm enough for a command, but you press on anyways. "This doesn't prove anything!"
"Oh, but I quite disagree/dissent/disapprove, it will prove all that needs to be," the Collector claims, casually drinking some tea despite the terrace you're on having been emptied of any other visitors; once the darkness literally came to life, everyone else cleared right out, trying to flee from their own shadows.
You grit your teeth, finding that its attitude quite annoys you. However, you can't lash out, so instead you gesture towards the area where Elena is currently leading the other four magical girls out of the affected zone. "They can't even fight back!"
"If fighting back was all it took to be a magical girl, there would be no disqualification/insufficiencies/failure failure failure at all. Just watch."
At that, a massive wave of shadowy 'people' manifests around your comrades on the ground in a wide radius, all of them climbing out of whatever dark corners there are to be found and heading straight towards them. You hurry to let Elena know, but this might just get… dicey, down there.
When shit came to a head, Bubbles was doing what she always did, being the bubbliest bubble that ever bubbled. It was kind of her thing. Sadly, incorporeal shadow fucks weren't all that sexy, nor could she really affect them with her usual strategy against things without giant cocks of punching them in the face until they dropped, so she just ran instead.
Not that everyone else was doing any better than her. None of them could really do much of anything about the things attacking them right now, so until someone figured out a solution to this whole thing all they could do was to keep on evading a straight-on fight while they followed the ice chick.
Who had totally been sent here by Jackie, of course. Ice was kind of her thing, nobody needed to be a genius to figure that one out.
Then, because of course, they were, like, totally surrounded by hundreds of the things in all directions the moment they turned a corner. Which was kind of an issue. "Girls, I think we're fucked," Bubbles said, "but not in the good way this time."
"This might be an issue, yes," Mitsuko, as she'd introduced herself, agreed. Because she was totes right. "I can create a barrier against at most some of them, but they can break through quickly."
Kerrie clicked her tongue, hand on her sword's grip. "Okay, change of plans. Olivia, you're the most mobile out of all of us with Jackie gone. You jump out of this and-"
"What? No, fuck you!" If it were any other situation, Bubbles would've done just that the moment she asked. Or she would've copped a feel, at least. "I ain't leaving all of you behind to get your faces stolen or whatever these things do!"
"It's the only way out of this mess," their intrepid leader-ette insisted. "You need to get up on the rooftops, find Jackie and ask her to come evacuate all of us."
The ice woman snapped her fingers, which were perfectly manicured, by the way. Bubbles had an eye for stuff like that. The state of someone's nails said a lot about that person. "Alternatively, you could simply ask me, as I am telepathically connected to my creator."
"Or that. Definitely that, in fact." Ignoring the still advancing line of shadow fucks, Kerrie turned back towards Olivia. "Still, the point stands. You may as well-"
"No!" Olivia crossed her arms, green hair waving as she scowled in rejection. "I won't let you leave me out now! I'm staying and that's final!"
"…Did whatever scrambled your brain just make you act as difficult as you possibly could?"
"Hmpf!" Demonstratively turning away from Kerrie, Olivia saw… the same thing Bubbles saw in that moment, her eyes shooting wide open. "Watch out!"
Crap! Not enough time! Throwing herself at Mitsuko, who like her had been watching the quarrel going on from the sidelines, Bubbles pushed both of them as far as she could, letting them avoid the big fat fucking clusterfuck of shadow fucks soundlessly falling down at them from above, the things having jumped from a couple of windows all at the same time.
Was it just her or were they getting smarter now? Ugh, screw it, priorities. "You okay Pinky?"
"I would prefer being addressed by my name, but yes, I am unhurt," Mitsuko said, lying on her back as she was. "What about Olivia, though? She was already erratic."
Yeah, crap. Getting up and helping the Japanese girl to follow her, Bubbles navigated around the slowly untangling mass of limbs, most of which were stretching towards whoever was closest to them. Only to find- "Well shit. Ollie, you okay?"
One of the shadow fucks had managed to touch her. And was now half-stuck inside of her, its low body poking out of her back.
"Never… Better…" She grunted out with a strained smile, gritting her teeth. "This is… Nothing…"
Okay, this was officially worrying now.
Being touched by the shadow thingy felt weird, at first. Kind of like something wet, except it didn't leave any residue or anything until you realized your clothes were soaking up your cold sweat.
Then it just felt cold, and dry, and like getting a bad grade in school or disappointing your parents. It felt like something bad had happened, like it was going to keep happening and it was all your own fault somehow.
It felt like shit, was what she was saying, and Olivia wasn't about to be slowed down by some pathetic shit like that! It would take some much more better, prime quality shit to bother her!
So she gave everyone a thumbs up as they all quickly relocated inside a building, nobody really willing to present a target for the kind of suicidal divebombing their enemies had employed against them.
"Girl you look like you're coming off enough speed to give a bus full of university football players a collective heart attack," Bubbles told her. "Can we, like, try to pull this thing out?"
"Wait, it's still stuck?!" Looking over her back, Olivia discovered that, yeah, a pair of legs was quietly kicking out behind it. "What the hell…"
"Okay, I'll take the left side, Bubbles, you go right. Don't worry Truth Seeker, we'll have you right as rain in a jiffy," Kerrie claimed.
She, of course, had a different opinion about this. "Don't!" Holding out both hands as though to ward them off, Olivia stopped them. "It somehow got inside me when it touched me, right? What if it gets you guys, too? We can't risk it!"
After all, they were her friends, and she refused to let anything but herself touch them! No way, no how!
"But we have to do something, Olivia," Kerrie plead with her, but that only made her more resolute in rejecting that terrible idea. "It's obviously messing with you somehow!"
"I'm fine!" Shaking her head, she ignored the constant, pressing distilled failure trying to worm its way into her head. Joke was on it, though, she was way beyond such infinitesimal things!
Olivia was used to feelings of failure twenty, no, fifty times as great! This was nothing compared to how she usually felt, and she'd done alright until now anyways, so all of that could go screw itself with a rusty screwdriver!
"Really? Because you don't look fine." Kerrie crossed her arms, though Bubbles, by contrast, just tilted her head.
"Yeah girl, you got a cold or something? Some freaky shadow STD?" Coming closer, the almost naked girl just reached out and laid a hand on her forehead. "Don't feel like a fever."
"Buzz off," Olivia most certainly did not pout, nor growl cutely. "I'll just-"
"Wait a second, I got something that could work." Holding up a hand, Kerrie took something out the pockets on her magical costume- a vial of water or something? "Yah!"
"Hey!" Being splattered with water by surprise wasn't fun.
"Oooh…" Mitsuko clapped her hands, having taken up position behind Olivia to observe her unbidden houseguest. "It seems to be dissolving on its own, now."
"I knew that holy water was going to come in handy at some point," Kerrie grinned smugly. "How do you feel, Truth Seeker?"
"…Like a wet dog," she complained, shooting her an annoyed look. "But thank you, I guess. Do you have any more of that?"
"No, this was all… I did stock up some thanks to that strange priest person, but I left the other nine flasks at the base."
"Ahh, 'cause we never needed any until now, huh?" Olivia nodded. Then, she stiffened. "A priest, you said? Priests are dangerous, don't you know? They're all secretly into touching little girls and boys!"
Her parents had told her that was why they didn't go to church when she'd asked, that one time. Also, she couldn't allow anyone else to molest Kerrie! That was an in-team privilege!
"Pretty sure that one is dangerous for entirely different reasons," the black-haired girl muttered, only serving to increase Olivia's panic levels. "Don't worry, it's fine. Now how do we get out of here without being surrounded?"
"Ahh, screw it!" Throwing her hands up in the air, Olivia decided to stop giving fucks, they obviously were't appreciated anyway. "I'll deal with it, I guess."
"Hmm, somewhat of a tsundere, but fiercely protective of friends." The Collector's words are so out of left field, you figure it somehow created a whole new parallel universe of fields to be left of. "Some minus points for its possessive nature, however."
"What are you talking about now?" You mutter even as you abandon any attempts at actually aiming and, instead, simply use your massive magical holy cross bombard a geeral area with loads of spears at once.
With the sheer target density down there, you still hit more often than not, which is actually a better rate of success as far as that's concerned than before. Totally not depressing, that.
"Why, your evaluation/judgement/test of character, of course!"
"…'m not a tsundere," you mutter as you refuse to keep eye contact with any of the Collector's empty eye sockets available.
"Of course not. She is, right now." Infuriatingly wrong as it is, you don't figure arguing will do much good. "Determined beyond reason, too, which is a plus/positive/not getting your ass demoted. Combined with the loyalty/power of friendship demonstrated… You pass/remain/live to see another day!"
"…" You blink in mind surprise. "Already?"
"Yes indeed/positive/indeed-ery! We shall be done here." The Collector gets up, only to put two of its 'left' hands onto the table, leaning towards you. "For today."
"…I'm not sure I can stand much more of this. Also, could you please put those shadow-things back to where you got them from?"
"Mm, mhm… No." With that, the Collector vanishes. No puff of smoke, no light show, it's just there one moment, then gone the next.
"Prick," you mumble, looking out over the figurative ocean of teeming shadows swarming the area below the building you're on. "Could've told me when I go back to normal."
"Chuuh." Ah, look who it is, Brian is brave enough to talk to you now that your company's gone. "Typically, the Collector's identity manipulation lasts for up to forty-eight hours, though most known cases cease within twenty-four hours instead. Unless they have been made permanent, puchuh."
Great. Just great. And you don't suppose you can just-
"Chuuh, it can be reversed, but doing so is expensive and time-consuming. Wait and see first, we can go this route if it decides to be a bigger chuh than usual."
…Fair enough. "Okay, but how do we deal with… that?" You ask, vaguely gesturing at the chaos happening on street level.
"Chuh, better get to shooting those spears. You'll be here all day otherwise, puuh."
You sigh. Then, a sizable portion of a building just up and breaks apart, the wall falling down to turn into a bridge of some sort that lets the girls down there rush along it and enter the next building while the shadows are still busy trying to squeeze out from under or trying to climb it to get at them.
You sigh again. Cleaning all of this up with be so much effort.
Thankfully, now that the Collector is gone, no further shadow-creatures are being created, so all you have to do is to mop up the rest, as it were.
'All' you have to do. It's still several thousand of the things, and cleanup does take you a little over two hours before you're sure you're done; you actually do nearly run out of mana a time or two so you have to actually slow down shooting your magical holy spears a bit on those occasions.
However, you do discover that the holy water you keep in your box of convenient storage also does work wonders on these things, as all you need to do is to load it into the water gun parts of your pistols and shooting it off the roof to produce somewhat of a mist of fine droplets, thanks to the distance the blessed substance travels on the way down.
Physics! They are applied here. And, well, even just a little bit of the stuff is enough to mess up the things currently terrorizing the area while still on orders from the Collector, as they do keep on converging towards the four girls fighting them directly.
Speaking of, they have begun to use the holy spears you keep on launching at the creatures following them as weapons themselves, making good use of them at Elena's suggestion, once you ask her to tell them they can do that. Olivia, in particular, is just gathering up whole bundles of them so she can throw them herself whenever enemies show their… non-faces anywhere near the group.
In the end, you mostly just need to have them camp out in an open intersection to make sure that even the slower shadow-people straggling behind the rest are properly disposed of, essentially luring them where you have an open line of fire.
Also, Elena is amazing. Once you've confirmed that her usual magical weapons don't work of these shades, she just switches over to picked up holy spears herself, turning once more into a whirlwind of very much efficient violence that rivals Olivia, even though the green-haired magical girl in question is used to wielding two spears at once.
Still, the rest of this whole… thing… is fairly uneventful, now that the source of the problem is gone. So much so, you can finally relax and join the other girls down on the ground, just a little before lunch time.
Of course doing so is a little more complicated than walking up to them with a greeting on your lips. No, that would be way too hard for you to do; instead, you peek around the corner from the nearest building, watching. Waiting.
Waiting for the right moment to try and join them. While fidgeting a bunch.
"So the holy water worked to dispel the possession, but it hasn't undone… whatever's wrong with you," Kerrie sums up the situation as it involves Olivia.
"Hey! There can't be anything wrong with me because I'm the best, okay?" Who responds with her arm crossed and eyes narrowed.
"Dunno, I kinda like this Ollie," Bubbles points out, only for Mitsuko to nod along in apparent agreement.
"There is no reason to make a great intervention out of this. That time of the month can have anyone out of sorts."
An awkward pause follows, during which Kerrie makes a face of embarrassed, but overwhelming understanding, whereas Olivia grows red and angry.
"So sorry I totally didn't think-"
"That's a lie and a misunderstanding-"
"It's totally okay we all get it-"
"It's not my period!"
An even more awkward silence covers the entire area like a blanket once Olivia screams that last bit out, making you duck behind cover again. There's no possible way you could hop in there no-
You're grabbed from behind, the loss of the ground sending you into a brief panic. "Wawawah!"
Your limbs flailing, you are forcefully deported towards the other girls, a look backwards letting you know that it's none other than Elena that is doing this to you. The entire affair is also, you realize when you look back forwards, loud enough to alert the other four to your presence!
"Wawawawawawawawa!"
Being carried forward like this, you just kind of hang in Elena's hands, unable to do much of anything.
"In case you were wondering," your daughter, who is being very mean to you right now, says, "this is the cause of that sudden change of attitude. The cause of this mess swapped Jackie's and Olivia's character."
You fidget some more, not meeting anyone's eyes. Olivia, meanwhile, comes trampling up to you, peering at your face.
"Mhmhmhm, hahaha, muaaaahahahaha! Finally, the turn has tabled!"
Bubbles and Kerrie exchange a look. "Did she just do the three-stage laugh thing?" "She sure did. We should be worried."
"Wawah…" You have no idea what to do or say now.
Before you can find any words or a way to direct the conversation, it spirals completely out of your control, your aborted interjections unable to influence the course of discussion. And so, without your input, knowledge nor approval, it is decided that all of you shall go dine in a relatively nearby Japanese restaurant that was largely outside the splash radius of today's 'activities'.
Of course you are not allowed to walk normally under your own power, but instead are still being carried by Elena, who has since decided that this mode of transportation, apparently, suited you best. Beset by social anxiety, you cannot find in yourself the energy to argue towards the opposite.
Especially when Olivia demands to carry you as well, only to be denied by your verily icy daughter. You are not getting between those two, even if you technically are the object of their disagreement already.
Before long, you are sitting inside aforementioned restaurant, only, you are situated atop Elena's lap as she plays with your hair. Her golem body is, at this time, not phenomenally tall measured against the average woman, but it does have proportions that allow her to handle you as though you were a kid.
Mostly because your body is short and you're stuck with that. And will be for the time being, otherwise you'd have made yourself taller already.
Boxed in by your treacherous daughter, you can't do much about it when the food arrives, including your big ramen bowl. You just kind of ordered it because you're ephemerally aware of ramen as a cultural thing, and also because Kerrie ordered a bowl herself and you discovered you cave to peer pressure of any kind very easily.
And if it's just ordering what someone else just did because you're panicking and unsure what to pick so you just add the same order on top.
That said, at least there's one thing you can do here. "Oh yeah, I'll pay," you say, which for some reason immediately has Mitsuko perk up, drawing a purse from the inside of her magical girl costume.
"Oh no, I will," she tells you, slamming two hundred dollars onto the desk. "It was my suggestion we come here, after all."
"But…" You really wanted to buy yourself some clout so you could make sure nobody started making fun of you…
"No." And that is that, you suppose. "Also, I shall now stroke your hair, for it looks exceedingly silky."
"It is," Elena agrees, to approving nods from both Olivia and Bubbles, before she tilts you where you sit on her lap so Mitsuko can reach your head easier. "Here you go."
"Wait a second, why does everyone know how silky Jackie's hair is?!" Kerrie asks, both hands on the table. "Did I miss anything or-"
"She's totally my girlfriend," Olivia brazenly claims, putting down the law. Or the 'law', considering how wrong she is. Not that you'll be telling her, in front of witnesses like this.
Instead, Elena is the one who snorts at that exclamation. "Dream on."
"It's true! Anyone saying otherwise gets speared and grilled over a fire pit!"
"Obviously you don't even know Jackie hates fire over it being opposed to her element," your daughter remarks, smugly grinning down at her.
Kerrie is the one to answer to that one. "Does that mean you don't like me, Jackie?"
"N-no," you say before you can think better of it. "Y-you're kind of weeb-y, but I don't… dislike you."
"Aw man, is it because of the katana? Because I'm gonna say, I do think it's pretty cool."
"Ara ara," Mitsuko laugh behind an open hand, "it seems someone's favorability rating is not as high as expected. How about me, Jackie?"
You blink at the pink-ette. "Uhm, your magic has pretty colors and you're very strong?"
Before this can turn into a whole 'make Jackie say nice things about people' party, however, Bubbles claps her hands once, drawing attention away from you. "I dunno 'bout you guys, but, like, the food's gonna get cold, so let's eat and we can all eye-fuck each other afterwards, 'kay?"
Anything to get you out of this situation. Actually- "Will you stop patting my head?" You ask with possibly teary eyes as more than one hand is still in contact with your braincase and its protective keratinous tissue.
"No." "Nope." "I do not believe so."
You resentfully grumble at Elena, Olivia and Mitsuko, in that order. They're bullying you, all of them! Meanie bullies!
And that goes double when you try to take up your spoon, only for it to be stolen from you at the hands of your rebellious, golem-projected, meanie-bully offspring. "We'll take turns feeding her, yeah?"
The agreement she receives is one single, big betrayal. Even Kerrie is joining in! You- you won't kind of like her a little more as revenge, there!
…Though getting a taste of everyone else's food is kind of nice. Still, you're not a pet!
There exists one in hindsight obvious issue with eating and drinking a bunch to keep your mouth busy as an excuse for why you can't talk at a given moment- something that, despite your magical advantages in this direction, manages to catch you off guard.
Simply put, you have to pee. You don't have to go often, way less than normal, in fact, thanks to… one of the many perks that came with the job of being a magical girl, but that's when you think back and realize you didn't go in the morning, which your normal routine would entail.
You blame it on the Collector, or you will once you regain your capacity to hold the pettiest of grudges. In the meantime, though, you really need to go, and so there's… only really one choice, when you think about it.
"Excuse me?" You ask, wiggling a little to try and loosen Elena's grasp. "Gotta use the facilities…"
"Oh?" She asks, an evil grin on her lips. "What kind of facilities? The cooking facilities? I don't think they'd let you into the kitchen. Or maybe…"
She starts to hug you closer instead of letting you go, her slender arms putting a little pressure on your belly- and on your bladder. "Uuuhhh… The toilet, I gotta… toilet…" You mumble out, mild distress obvious.
"Aww, guess it can't be helped, hm? Hey Greenie, mind letting us up?"
Of course you can't just go to the toilet yourself. That would be too easy.
"Even better, I'm coming with." Hopping off her seat, Olivia makes some space for you and Elena to get up yourselves, not that you get to do much of that thanks to how you're still held in her arms.
You're starting to feel like a piece of luggage. Or a sack of potatoes. Actually, being a sack of potatoes would be kind of nice- that way at least any weight you put on would be directly converted into nutritious food with many uses and lots of delicious tastes to be produced from it.
…That train of thought really got away from what you were trying to think about, didn't it?
By the time you know it, you're already halfway to this place's toilets, held under Elena's arm when you try to struggle free. In the end, the best way you can describe how you feel when you enter the facilities themselves is…
Sullen. Sullen is a good word. You could also say you're pouting, but your first attempt sounds a lot more dignified.
Now why are you being crowded into a single stall together with both Elena and Olivia? You were aware girls usually go to the toilet in small packs, but this…
"Go ahead, you can go now," your daughter smiles mischievously, holding you up in front of the toilet, her hands under your arms.
"Right, right! Don't worry, this is all normal, ain't it?" Olivia agrees, fiddling with your skirt and pulling it up so she can wrest your panties from your hips.
You might be in danger here. Just a feeling. Also, you aren't sure if you can pee when you're being watched…
You can't really free yourself, so in the end you have to stay just like that, letting Olivia aim your penis in lieu of doing so yourself because, apparently, that's forbidden.
By both her and Elena, who holds you in the air. Which is very rude of her, by the way.
Thus stuck in place just like you are stuck in life, unable to go anywhere your circumstances haven't stuck you in, you just try to be done with business as quickly as you can, get it over with so you can leave as quickly as possible.
…You just realized this is how most people treat their nine-to-five jobs at the office, actually. You always just considered your own job as, like, this list of tasks that you went through one by one, earning yourself the satisfaction of making a bunch of cash for minimal effort some days and a little less minimal amounts other days, but when you just deeply, profoundly do not want to be where you are, doing what you are…
The way some people act just makes a lot more sense, really. Not everyone takes job satisfaction for granted the way you did, and even then if you were seriously annoyed after work you'd just take a pit stop on the way and murder someone to work off your aggravation.
…Oh, you just realized you're a terrible person. Not that you should be surprised, what else would you be?
…Oh, you just realized… That you're done peeing, but even though no more liquid is pattering down into the toilet, you're still being hoisted up in the air. Looking down at where Olivia is still standing next to you handling your penis, you give her a confused look.
Then you have to hold back a gasp when she starts to fondle it with both hands, even as a second pair of (pleasantly) cold hands starts to feel up your hips, slowly inching down from there.
"Did…" You have to swallow as the sudden arousal kind of messes with your train of thought. "Did Elena grow more arms?"
"She did," your daughter whispers into your ear, slowly pulling you closer to rest against her chest. "And that's not the only thing she grew."
Something hard, cold and yet simultaneously soft, somehow, pokes you from below, pushing between your thighs and coming to a rest right below your nether lips, beneath your own male anatomy.
Said anatomy means you can't see what is causing this sensation, exactly, but you can imagine well enough. Breath stuck in your throat, you consider actually struggling, even as you are fully aware that Elena's body is animated with the full strength of your magic- bodily making her physically stronger than you are.
Then, however, Olivia's hands around your half-hard erection clamp on to that same erection harder, squeezing your thoughts out of you with a couple of strokes as you can't help but grow very hard indeed.
Also, all your limbs go pretty slack, just because the blood you need in your brain to think and do things has just abandoned its post and instead went to reinforce that area. It can't really be helped.
"Hey, sit down," Olivia says quietly, closing the toilet's lid so it becomes somewhat of a seat. It's pretty clean in here, so it probably wouldn't even give someone tetanus on touch- then you process what she's talking about. "Can't reach her dick like this."
"Fair enough," Elena purrs in response, one of her extra arm wrapping around your belly as she does just that. Of course when she sits down after turning around, you feel the icy, fully erect rod she grew on herself pressing into you as she securely pulls you onto her lap, spreading your poor pussy wide open.
Your legs are spread wide, not because you want to, but rather just because you suddenly have a huge dick made of ice in your snatch, reflexively making you try to alleviate the size of the intruding member. That's about the point where Olivia grabs your cheek, forcefully giving you a kiss while her free hand is busy discarding her own panties on the floor.
Next she's climbing on your lap, yourself still caught in Elena's lap in turn, and grabs your very much hard penis to tilt it towards herself, taking it into herself with enviable ease. Your choked moan at the sensory overload you're going through is aborted when her lips find yours again, and so you just hold onto her as her hips come closer and closer to your own.
She feels just as tight as you imagine you have to feel for Elena, her stupidly huge golem penis stretching you open. Finally, everyone is as deep inside you or taking you as deep inside of themselves as possible, your womb cooled by your disembodied daughter's cock made of living ice even as it feels your own cock is burning up inside Olivia's love tunnel, poking hers.
You moan into her mouth in full now, involuntarily making out with the green-haired girl when her and Elena wordlessly agree to start moving. Your insides feel like a constantly shifting, heady mess as the latter stirs them up, all the while Olivia is milking your dick for all it's worth with how she's riding it.
You try to last as long as you can, but- there's just no way you can hold back here! It's too much! So instead, you tightly hold onto Olivia's waist, grinding your butt against Elena every time she pulls you down to take her dick. You can't keep going for very long, but at least-
"Nuuuuh…"
You come, thick semen firing into Olivia, her quivering flesh happily receiving your pleasure. At the same time, something cold and fluffy fills you up in turn, almost like- did Elena come inside you? Can she even do that? Like, you know she can change her body's shape and even feel through it, but…?
Any such thoughts are quickly washed out of your brain at the extra hands sneaking under your clothes, squeezing your breasts and pinching your nipples. That's more than enough stimulation to keep you just as hard and wet as you were already, and it doesn't seem like either of the two that cornered you in here are going to let up.
"Time for round two," Olivia purrs, hands stroking through your hair as she looks you deep in the eyes, her insides still clutching onto your rod.
"And dick number two, too," Elena adds, something cold and hard poking you again- just that this time, it's poking your butt instead. "Better pucker up~…"
Your half surprised, half complaining yell is swallowed back down involuntarily when she wraps two hands around your neck, choking you just a little, just enough to keep you quiet. You've lost all track of what arms she's using where and how, but right in the moment you have some other priorities, to say the least.
You also lose all track of time, being as… preoccupied… as you are, but you feel like that one, at least, isn't your fault, pinned between the two predators that are using your body as much as they want. Being fucked in both holes down there while a lithe, very enthusiastic girl is bouncing herself on your lap can do that to you.
The Jackie comes running from the bathroom, having escaped her dreadful captors' clutches (quite literally so, in some ways). However, in her haste, she is unable to make good on her escape.
Stumbling on nothing much at all, she slams to the ground, her forehead meeting it with a meaty thud. Thankfully, her usual hard head protects her tender, easily bruised neural matter from any real harm, beyond the pain she now feels.
Sitting up, she holds her rapidly reddening forehead. Her magical regeneration will see her healed and free of debilitating hurt in short order, yet for the moment, all that is left to her is to hold a hand to it as tears gather in her eyes.
"Uuuuuuh…" She does not cry, for such would require her to let this flood loose upon her face, or some other conveniently nearby surface.
"Aww, did you hurt yourself?" A voice comes from behind her. "Here, let's put a little ice on it."
"Hey, no fair! I wanna fuss over her as well!"
"First come, first served."
The three do, one way or another, return to their table, whereupon they are greeted by a cranky Kerrie complaining about them spending forty minutes on the toilet. Followed by an interrogation that receives no real answers beyond Olivia's innocent whistling, Elena's smug smiles and Jackie judiciously avoiding everyone's eyes.
The Collector nodded. Truly worthy of a Magical Girl Show.
It is not until you return home that the… effect… is released, and even then it only happens after you are done retreating to your room on the highest floor of the house, balling yourself up with a bunch of your pillows to wait until your heart stopped fluttering and your insides stopped feeling weird.
You regenerate, why is it that you still ended up walking bowlegged all the way until you realized you could just unsummon Elena's body and fly on an ice platform instead? Well, obviously it just speaks of the sheer width and size of the penises she decided to grow to hammer into you, but…
Anyways, you shall punish her later, you decide as you sit there in the little cave you produced out of your bedding, the urge to hide inside a safe place causing you to do this and cuddle up with Tabitha, who has been kneading the various assorted pieces of cloth smelling a lot like you since when she isn't rubbing her snout against your hands and wrists.
Or your face. Kitty smoochies make you happy even when you're currently in Doctor Depresso Mode.
Speaking of Doctor Depresso, you shall definitely have to punish Olivia for what she did while emboldened by your very own most noblest of mindsets. If she were not pregnant already, you would string her up on a bondage cross and use her as an onahole until her belly was bloated to look the part!
The mere thought of this overly daring wretch makes you boil with indignation! And there is no other reason whatsoever as to why you would feel as such. Why, you most certainly must punish her.
Tomorrow. Not today. You had more than enough 'action' for today. You are so unused to feeling any form of fear, not to mention the occasionally repeating feelings of terror Olivia's weak state of mind imposed upon you, so you're kind of tuckered out.
No, you are not pouting over being repeatedly taken advantage of in the public bathroom of that restaurant. As much as the two culprits in this case could. For forty minutes straight. Until you literally couldn't walk straight anymore. No, that would be completely insane and removed from any sense of reality.
Muhuhu, I always thought I was kind of hot, but now I can confirm I always was really fuckable all along.
No! You shall not listen to the ramblings of the mad entities from beyond life and death whispering inside your head-
The real friends are the fuckbuddies we made along the way, so I guess Olivia's a good doggie now, instead of just a puppy.
Uuu! You wiggle around inside your bed, shaking your head. Inconceivable! She's always been and will always be a puppy! A demented, punishment-seeking puppy!
…This whole episode took a lot out of you. You really need to drink some Viridis sap to recover from it, you decide. Didn't you have some of the stuff lying in the fridge at some point?
Clearly, after all that happened today, you earned yourself a bit of a reward, in your own exceedingly humble personal opinion. In fact, you would say that it is fundamentally necessary to reward yourself to maintain the integrity of reality, for you know not what terrible things you may do to the time-space continuum if left un-rewarded.
Except that they would, obviously, be verily terrible. That much should be obvious. Fear the Wrath of the Jackie.
As such, when you venture out into the wider world beyond your burrito-nest (just kind of how its shape turned out), you seek out the wondrous land of magical delights known only as The Kitchen, domain of the mighty wizard known as Chuckie the Bountiful.
Or, in other words, you put on some clothes and go ask her to make you something nice to eat.
"Chuckieeee…"
"Oh?" Realizing you pitter-pattered up to her to tug at her shirt, the farmgirl turned monster turned household aide turns to look down at you. "What is it, Jackie?"
"I'm tired," you whine, giving her big kitty cat eyes. "An' hungry. Can I have pancakes?"
Chuckling, the girl you recruited to keep your place in a semblance of order musses up your hair. Such irony. "Well, I'll see what we can do. Why don't you sit down while I check if we have the ingredients?"
"M'kay." Doing as she asks, you clear your throat. "Also, can they be chocolate?"
"Jackie, we talked about this. You can't just eat chocolate for every meal," Chuckie chastises you chidingly.
"I know. Just this once?" You let your lips quiver, a great, pitiful pout produced by your extremely expressive face. "Please?"
While you're talking, Chuckie is opening some of the cupboards, taking stock of the ingredients as she said- only to find that, through some mysterious circumstances, an unknown hand has finely diced a dozen or so of your chocolate fruits into fine chunks, perfect for doing such things as, say, mixing them into batter to turn pancakes into a fantastical wonder of chocolate-y goodness.
She sighs in immediate understanding, smiling at you indulgently. "Fine, but just this once, you hear me? I'll still make something substantial for dinner later and you won't be allowed to complain."
You nod eagerly. That sounds like a fair deal, just as long as you get those chocolate pancakes. You really, really earned them this time around.
Once you have fortified your nutritious balance sheet's sugar intake as well as your spirits, you take a moment to consider what great undertaking you shall pursue next.
Not because you see any need to regain any lost honor, or to ascertain your grand ability to Get Shit Done (trademark pending). That would be stupid.
Instead, you are merely driven by the desire to see that all is right within your domain, and naught of its residents are in need of correction. Such is the intensity of your very own noblesse oblige, you cannot help but pursue it.
Towards this end, you venture forth into the expanse of your glorious gardens of abundance, to seek out the Ice-And-Nothing-Else Type living within them. Your journey leads you through the Forest of Winter, where you swiftly ignore the also Ice-And-Nothing-Else Types skittering around here and there, the small creatures made of living ice having made this area their home.
There aren't too many of them, so it's okay. Maybe it's because they're made of the same stuff your magic is or something, but you don't have any panic attack as long as they keep their distance and you can steel yourself before encountering them, something made much easier by the fact that they're kind of localized in the cooler area that somehow came to be within your backyard.
You aren't entirely sure how it works, you'd probably have to ask Brian, but you suspect the trees are somehow steadily sucking the warmth from their surroundings, collecting and redirecting it while they affect the localized climate a good bit. It's not omnipresent, but you can see hoarfrost on their bark every now and then, and a lot of the other vegetation in the area is also magically adjusted to thrive in the resulting environment.
The flowers look like they're made of clear ice, but they aren't, actually. Touching them reveals that their petals just kind of look like that. You blame magic for making that possible, personally.
The reason you conclude the way this place works the way it does, the cold spot inside the forest that's grown out of Viridis' presence, is the location in which you ultimately find the Ice Type you came for. The beautifully white, faintly insectoid-like (but not quite like that, you insist even in the privacy of your own mind) with sky-blue highlights is currently resting among the treetops, inside a basin created by several of the fruitless trees' branches intertwining into a watertight enclosure.
The only reason you even found her were the flying things (you decide they are Ice Type and refuse to look closer at them) keeping an eye on the area around her from up above, riding the current of warm air rising from the steaming water filling said basin. Because yeah, somehow, for some reason, there's a hot spring just somehow growing above the cold ground, and you'd bet it isn't the only one.
Her long, white-blue hair drifts in the warm spring that, to the best of your knowledge, somehow trickles out of the trees themselves, as she turns at your approach. Scleri, as you're shortening her name (because screw trying to pronounce the full thing, you'd need actual bug mouth parts to do it) lazily opens the four of her eyes that you can see, with the way her hair covers the other half, as you approach, smiling at you.
"Hello little darling, would you like to join me?"
You never could say no to that tone of voice.
Undressing is one of your many strengths, especially when you can just undo your magical girl transformation to remove your costume entirely, and so you quickly do exactly what Scleri suggested- you didn't actually bother to put on normal clothes this morning before transforming, so you don't have to deal with those replacing your costume or anything.
The water is really warm, but despite your preference for colder climates thanks to the magic surging through your body at all times, it's not too warm, either. In fact, you'd say it's just about right for a bath, even if your relationship with baths is… complicated at the moment, to say the least.
You don't get dirty anymore, you don't need to bathe! Nor shower or anything like that, really. Adding in how much of a pain it is to actually get a bath going, your tendency to just accidentally turn it into an ice bath instead whenever you're startled…
Not that you can't enjoy an ice bath instead, of course, but still, it's more trouble than it's worth, generally. You still do kind of enjoy this one, though.
Just wait until we tell Chuckie about this, a traitorous voice makes itself known in the back of your head, only to be summarily ignored in short order. She knows what she did.
"Hafuuh," you inadvertently sigh in contentment when you finally come to a step next to Scleri, closing your eyes and leaning onto a conveniently placed tree branch.
"It's nice, isn't it?" The Ice-Typed woman comments, reaching out to tug you a little closer to herself. You go along with it, of course.
"Mm," you make in agreement, your ability to communicate in monosyllabic, wordless sounds unmatched as ever. Also, despite being clad in her white-blue-ish exoskeleton, contact with her hand is surprisingly soft and pleasant against your skin.
You knew that much already, of course, but you think being wet and warmed up like this is making it just slippery enough to feel nice in a different way, so you lean into her to rub yourself against her side. You've had a long, exhausting day, you're allowed to do this.
Not that Scleri herself seems to be disagreeing, quietly chuckling to herself. "Now what brings you to this neck of the woods? Could it be you missed me?"
"…Not saying I didn't," you quickly say, your glib silver tongue once more showing its use. Just to be sure, you also look away from her as you try not to show you're aware you just kind of left her sitting around in your backyard for a while without really visiting her.
"Aww, so sweet! Sweet as honey, anyway. I've been busy getting set up and giving birth to everything I need, but now that I'm done, I've been thinking about coming to see you more often." She leans over to give the top of your head a kiss. You do not dislike this, but you still hold onto your head with both hand to protect it from further assault anyways.
"Alright," you say, not really seeing any issue with that. It's not like anyone you tolerate inside your place tends to be messy or anything, so Chuckie won't have reason to complain either. "Anything I can help you with?"
It's a question you just realized you probably should ask, considering you kind of forcefully relocated Scleri and all that. Sure, she was consenting to everything that was going on pretty enthusiastically, but making sure she doesn't forget you're the boss of this entire section of the Overcity and all that lives within it probably can't go amiss.
"Oh, let me think… Actually, you could come take a look at my new nest later, see if you can't help it along. The new cold section is taking a bit." You note that one down for later. Also, you heartily agree with Scleri embracing her true nature as an Ice Type. "That aside, you always could help me breed more children, you know…"
A soft, slippery hand grasps your dick under the water, the realities of sitting next to a big-tittied, pretty woman whose natural coloration consists of your favorite colors making themselves known. Meaning, you immediately get very hard, even before she spreads her legs and starts to finger herself as though to show you where your penis goes.
You'd like to think you've figured that one out already, but it never hurts to demonstrate your knowledge on the field of reproductive science.
In short order, you're gasping for air, your ribbed dick buried inside of Scleri's tight, hot Ice Type snatch as she lies back, smiling and moaning as you're going to town on her. Every thrust feels like it's drawing you in deeper, whereas pulling out is a challenge in more ways than one, her cum-hungry pussy literally pulling on you, beckoning with the joys of impregnation.
Her arms are slung around and stroking your back, hugging you closely and tenderly. It's easy to let yourself be drawn in, to lose all sight when your face is smooshed into her huge, soft tits, surrounded by the mammaries you're trying to fondle, but every time you manage to regain your senses and concentrate on slamming your big fat dick home, she gives you a deep kiss, with tongue, that tastes of honey and makes you start the process all over again.
Her legs are embracing you just as much as her arms, wrapped around your hips and pulling you in just as much as you're pushing into her. At some point, she comes, and so do you, and the only reason the hot tree spring isn't turning white are the knot at the base of your dick keeping it inside her and her own pussy greedily sucking it all in.
By the time you've stopped seeing stars, you're already back to railing the absurdly sexy chitin-clad woman. Helping with her home renovation needs may be hard to fit into your schedule at this rate…
Olivia sighed, looking out at nothing in particular as she sat on her bed, holding onto her giant plush crocodile with both arms.
Sometime after everyone had split up for the rest of the day, everyone having unanimously agreed that it was too late to go back to school anyways, the… The Swap, between her and Jackie, had come undone, returning her usual attitude back to her. This had led to several things happening all at once, chief of which was her sheepishly returning the cookie jar back to where it was meant to be while hoping her mom wouldn't notice.
Apparently, Jackie was the kind of girl that would not, in fact, be caught with her hand in the proverbial jar, and instead the kind that just stole the entire thing and blamed it on someone else.
She also was, as Olivia had considered with dawning horror, the kind of girl that would send anonymous emails to everyone in her class, each purposefully aimed at hurting them, making them fight someone else or implicating some other class member in the whole affair, down to sending one such mail to herself so she could act upset about it and deflect suspicion.
She may or may not have had somewhat of a panic attack when she thought back to what she had been doing while under the influence of her… Of Jackie's personality. And that was before she realized what she'd been doing back in that toilet stall while the team was meant to be celebrating their victory.
Sure, there had been a lot of 'celebrating', but… It made her feel really, really bad when she remembered the helpless look on Jackie's face. Sure, you could say that turnabout was fair play, but Olivia didn't want to think of herself like that, and especially not at Jackie.
Which had brought her up short for a bit, until she really figured out why. The whole thing where she was causing chaos and mistrust among her classmates was, in retrospect, really mean as well, but once she got over her initial shock, horror and the urge to just call the police and turn herself in, it also was the kind of prank that made her giggle breathlessly, hoping that it worked like she meant it to and instinctively think of how to avoid blame herself.
By contrast, she was feeling bad about what her and Elena, who may or may not be a split personality of Jackie's, had done to Jackie. Not because she hadn't enjoyed it (she had), nor because she wouldn't kind of do it again if she dared to (she would), but rather because she didn't want to do it while Jackie was just kind of cowering into herself the way Olivia often was while it happened.
Yeah, that was it. Olivia didn't just want to have sex with Jackie, she realized with a searing, piercing clarity, she wanted Jackie to enjoy it, too. A lot, if possible. She wanted to make it a mutual kind of thing, an equal interaction where they both had a lot of fun.
She realized she… um. She may or may not like Jackie a lot. Like, like like. It was something she'd been dancing around for a while, because she knew Jackie was just all kinds of scary and selfish a lot of the time, but she also knew that the white-haired girl she thought about so often had a possessive, almost nice side about her.
She'd experienced as much when she'd felt that possessive, stern kind of emotion herself. Olivia would have been ready to kill to protect and to keep Jackie to herself, and while there may be a little bit of herself in that, a lot of it had to have come from Jackie.
And why wouldn't Jackie be like that? The easy confidence, that practiced sense of superiority that came from nothing less than absolute fact, that stubborn determination to win it no matter what, regardless what 'it' was, that had been sufficient to just bull through supernatural, weaponized depression…
Olivia knew Jackie on a level she suspected very few others did, thanks to this new insight into her fellow magical girl, and she… She kind of liked her more for it, in a weird way. She'd had a taste for what it was like to be Jackie, to be free of any doubt or second guessing yourself, and she kind of admired her for it.
Hence why she was cuddling up inside her bed now, blushing and sometimes looking down at her belly before she looked away again while blushing more. When she'd claimed she was Jackie's girlfriend, it hadn't been… entirely… out of nowhere.
Olivia liked Jackie. She wasn't sure whether that was a like like, a like like or a 'like' like, but she liked her. That much was pretty clear by now. And she may or may not want to be girlfriends with her.
Not girl friends, not 'oh look they are such close friends' girls, full-on 'I'm gonna make out with you to mark my territory, now', 'I don't want you to look at anyone else but me', 'I want you to wear a white wedding dress' girlfriends.
…Which might be pretty hard. It might even be impossible. Jackie was… Her life was pretty complicated, and it involved a lot of people. By which she meant Jackie kind of slept around a lot, it was really obvious. And she'd been doing it so long, it might be impossible for her to stop.
'But that didn't matter now, did it?' She thought with a pang that reverberated painfully inside her heart. And stomach, but mostly her heart.
Because she may or may not be in love. What did that mean for her?
Mainly, it meant that she had to do what she always had to do, when it came to these things that made her belly feel like it was flipping, when she was so afraid of something she barely could understand it.
Olivia would have to scrape up every scrap of courage she had and… And try to get Jackie to like her back. She could do that. And maybe, if she was lucky and it worked out, a little more, but, well, one step at a time.
Just like when her heart started racing and that cold sweat crept up on her when she went to school, or when she imagined her parents' disappointed faces when she… did anything at all, come to think of it. Try to keep calm, if not collected, and always just keep going, one step to the next.
Her little trick hadn't failed her yet. Much, anyways.
And thinking of Jackie in a wedding dress was very unproductive. Not only was it out of reach, it just made her heart race even more every time, now that she was actively imagining and thinking about the concept of a real relationship with the rude, rapacious, mischievous, strong, smart, weirdly sweet and utterly confident girl.
It just made her blush a lot. The only upside here was that nobody knew, sitting inside her room as she was.
When the girl known to many only as 'Jackie' went to sleep, she did so while still buried balls deep inside of the insectile form of Scleriteaeaeaggadah, as an unlimbered tongue would paraphrase the name of the insect queen she was copulating with at the time.
Said queen was not in the least put off by this, of course, and merely pondered which was the root cause of this phenomenon: Did Jackie feel utterly safe in her embrace, or was she utterly secure in her power, such that she implicitly communicated that she would not be defeated even in her sleep?
The difference was academic in nature, however, seeing as 'Scleri', as she allowed less cunning linguists to call her, had no plans to lure Jackie in so as to finish her off and keep her as a pet- any such attempts would be met with steep disapproval by the entity known as Viridis. And as an insect, she had very little interest in both purely academic subjects and being subjected to the rather acute consequences of a nature spirit's uniquely untiring reprisal.
As such, she merely kept the most potent, useful and convenient breeding stud in the area inside of herself as she relocated back to her nest, which had been increasing in size quite rapidly ever since she had added the might of her swarm to the spread of the forested domain she was based out of.
Pruning trees, recycling and repurposing buildings; there were many sources for materials, if only one cared to look, and the recently enhanced architectural capabilities of some of her breeds certainly did not go amiss in expanding her very own territory, either.
Truly, her complements to Viridis. Some compromises she had to make, while unwelcome, were entirely worth the advantages gained in exchange.
It was thus that when she carried the source of the most useful genetic material for the purposes of enhancing her swarm into her nest, she did so by opening the great double doors hewn into wax hardened like stone, decorated with carvings of great armies in all form and sizes on one side, opposed by but one figure surrounded by distorted ice on the other.
A little tacky, perhaps, but the history of how she came to dwell in this land may well be preserved somewhere. And she would be lying if she claimed she did not like the idea of making the affair seem grander than it may have been at the time, to boot.
Inside, what awaited them was not a simple empty space waiting to be filled. It was a richly-decorated, wide open room, honey flowing through it in two even rivers. Its roof was far up above, the waxen construction built into surrounding trees that had since been strengthened by their connection to her hive.
Up front, on the other end of this singular room, was a throne. It could also be called an altar. This was not simply a part of her nest- her living quarters, assorted guest quarters, storage and breeding spaces were in another part entirely and indeed inaccessible from this point.
This was not a normal part of her hive. This was a place of worship. A place of authority. This was a throne room and it was a cathedral.
It was where she proceeded to have her kindly web-spinners cocoon her together with her breeding mate, to become as one as she would be fertilized repeatedly.
The time to breed yet another wave was at hand, and Scleri could hardly await it.
This is not the first time you wake up caught inside a cocoon of some kind and a weird, faintly sweet taste in your mouth. Not only has this happened before, technically it happened back when you were Jack, too, if you count that one time you got drunk off of that sweet sparkling wine and woke up tied up with the clothes of the three chicks that you were sleeping in a big pile with.
University was fun, what can you say. Still, the literal ins- Ice Type cocoon surrounding you and serving as a (surprisingly comfy) bed, or sleeping bag, rather, which is probably why you slept in today.
You think, anyways. It's kind of hard to estimate the time of day when the Overcity's sky is suspended in its eternal late evening and there's no birds or anything that blare their cries out loud any time a new day happens.
…You may or may not have had some bad experiences with that one crazy neighbor that thought it was a great idea to have a rooster as a pet. You also may or may not have thrown their bodies into the same bag when you were done with his shit.
Small details like this, miscellaneous memories and stuff, are slowly becoming more prevalent inside your head as time goes on. It's kind of fascinating to see how your brain is basically reconstructing and regaining memories of your life, especially as it didn't have of those originally, being Elena's brain to begin with and all.
I should be charging rent for letting you stay in here, daddy.
Nope, your daughter's still in timeout after what she did yesterday. Not gonna be engaging with that.
All you need to do now is to wiggle your way out of this thing, conjure yourself some clothes and seek out breakfast so your day can begin. That may sound like a hard, complicated endeavor, and it is, but you are more than ready for this great challenge!
"Wiggle, wiggle," you narrate as you begin the first step of your great plan, trying to get out of The Cocoon of Doom (trademark pending). "Wiggle wiggle."
You just kinda do this sometimes. Especially when you're focusing on some repetitive task, it just helps you stay focused.
You've almost got your whole upper body outside the opening where your head was sticking out of this thing at the start by the time you hear a pair of heavy doors open- and, looking around, this place looks kinda crazy. Whether in a good or a bad way, you aren't sure, but the carvings in the walls and the rivers of honey are pretty out there to be sure.
The latter kinda remind you of the depths of the… of the Hive you dealt with before you found the Ice Type. They were there too, though these ones are much straighter than the faux-natural, chaotically flowing ones back there.
Back to the freshly opened doors, you see… Oh hey, that's Moonmoon. What's she doing here?
"Yo, wazzup shortie, got stuck somewhere?"
"'m not short," you mumble, your tongue not yet having put on its silver coat this early in the morning. Much like the rest of yourself, it needs a bit to get into top form. "You're short."
"Haha, wow, you're, like, totally not awake yet. Here, lemme help you with that."
Before you know it, your field of view is filled by the golden-tailed, big-tittied girl's muff, her pussy basically stuffing itself into your mouth. On pure instinct, you give it a good, long lick, and immediately feel yourself perking up as you taste something sweet, slightly fizzy all over your tongue.
Oh wow, her 'juice' is, like, some kind of energy drink? Well, you just get right to obtaining as much of it as possible, it does taste pretty nice.
Now if only the owner of these fold would hold still for a second, instead of rubbing herself all over your face…
Several personal notes shall be added to your mental logbook of 'stuff you will remember'. One, Moonmoon's pussy is surprisingly tasty, and you really need to look into finding a way to harvest it for… personal recreational use, in case any magical police officers ask you.
Two, Moonmoon is kind of a dick sometimes. As she said, she did help you wake up, but afterwards she still left you stuck inside your temporary bedding, and getting out of this cocoon was actually kinda difficult. It's not really her being deliberately malicious or anything, you think, she just lost interest after she came a few times and wandered off in short order.
She's… intense, to say the least. Goes without saying, but it explains a lot about her and how she works.
Lastly, as for point number three, Scleri has some pretty damn nice digs, you have to admit. Sure they are filled with… Ice Types… and you have to deliberately ignore a lot of skittering little things when you come to take a look around… But her setup is pretty nice.
The whole construction is made of a discolored version of the same stuff her first hive was made of, except it also looks more… solid, rugged. Almost like worked stone instead of the horrid substances you suspect it to be. Built wide and sweeping, barely clearing the tops of the trees surrounding it, most of its bulk is actually hidden underground, where you refuse to set foot until the place's owner assures you you won't encounter any of the creatures teeming within.
You like Scleri. You do not like any of her offspring that chitters, has eight or more limbs or generally fails to live up to the concept of a proper Ice Type. One that you can tolerate without your skin breaking out into hives of its own.
Down there, you soon happen upon the place Scleri asked you to take a look at yesterday, before you got… distracted. In the part of the hive that hits upon the freezing climates of what you have decided to call your Winter Garden for now, the nest's construction is covered with rime, not unlike on the surface, and it looks a lot like the creatures responsible for building this stuff just kind of stopped halfway through, with a few missing sections of walls and unfinished chambers here and there.
"As you can see, the low temperature made it impossible to continue construction," Scleri explains, leading you along by the hand. "These were meant to be areas for any species that would prefer the cold, but it would take quite a while to breed new ones that can weather this environment and build by themselves. The soil is just too cool."
"Mhm, mhm," you nod, understanding the logistical challenges involved here (all the while you studiously ignore the very idea of what the things that are meant to live here would look like). The tunnels and all are perfectly wide enough for you and Scleri to walk around alongside each other, but somehow you get the feeling that's more because of the size and number of intended inhabitants than any kind of consideration for human-sized visitors.
Either way, it's pleasantly cool here and propping up Scleri's operations doesn't really hinder your own, if anything she'll be helpful down the line one way or another. So it's not a bad idea to help her out a little.
"I can do ice instead. Just show me where and what I should do," you thus tell her, looking up at her white-armored bust and its softly blue nipples.
Not your fault her face is so far up you have trouble actually seeing it over her big badonkas.
Having properly reinforced and even expanded the nest Scleri has been building in your backyard (it really is looking a lot different compared to the last time you saw her), you return from your little mini-adventure with loot in the form of a jar made of unknown material (you were afraid to ask) filled with extra-delicious honey from her.
It was a reward for the help, and for the breeding, apparently. Some would probably feel insulted at being paid for sex, but if anything you just figure it makes sense; these are some premium Jackie genetics you're handing out here, of course people would pay you for it.
You should take a fee from everyone you fuck, in fact. It's only sensible to, now that you really think about it.
About the honey you received, though, it really is quite delicious, as a breakfast experiment you conduct with Chuckie's help confirms. Fried honeyed toast is surprisingly delectable, for the record.
The question, though, is what to do with the majority of this stuff. The honey is somewhat magical, just not in an overt way- your senses for these things confirm as much. Therefore, you could go and find other uses than culinary ones for it- the question is whether you should.
It really is that bloody delicious. You might even add it to tea or something, as a natural sweetener and stuff. Not that you often drink tea, but you kind of like the idea.
It would also make you look, like, super classy. Can't forget that part.
Then again, it's not like you can't get more, either, you just need to get Scleri to top off your supplies if you want more. Doing so may require some work in itself, sure, but hey, still easier than trying to get honey from non-intelligent magical bees or some shit.
Which, for the record, you totally would do. Bees deserve to be bullied, for they are loud, buzzing doom-bringing ends to any relaxation to be had on any warm days.
You hate bugs. They must be punished for existing at every possible turn. Good thing Scleri is an Ice Type instead, else your totally hypocritical view on magical fantasy racism would be seriously challenged.
"Muh," you mumble as you chew that honeyed toast, enjoying its sweet, crispy goodness. Chuckie has to have some kind of… food-ening magic or something, it's impossible to explain what she can do in the kitchen otherwise.
"You like it, Jackie?" The former farmer's daughter asks when you make a noise of mild enjoyment, patting your head.
You lean into her hand, eyes blinking slowly as you continue to consume the food.
"I'll take that as a yes, then."
Huh. You know, you wouldn't have expected honey, of all things, to be a flavor that magic could be, but uh, here you are. Not that you're complaining, mind you, having a vial of what looks like honey, but is most definitely the magical essence of what it is to be honey instead, in hand.
Your magical senses confirm as much. Incidentally, you've started to 'taste' magic a little, the mild synesthesia that tends to mix itself into your magical perception acting up again now that you've got something with a particularly sweet 'taste' to itself.
It's kind of weird, tasting things with what your brain tells you are your eyes, but that's also just a side effect of the way it interprets your additional sense. That doesn't stop you from brain-licking the vial of super-honey-stuff you now have, of course.
It's very sweet. You approve of it and may have to acquire more later on. Thinking about it, could you possibly create some kind of… ever-full jar of honey?
Because if so, you'd totally invest this stuff into doing so. Both because it would be awesome and as a proof of concept for your next creation, that being a bar of chocolate that ever ends no matter how much of it you pull out of its packaging.
You have no idea whether this is possible, but you're willing to do some research, see if Brian can help you with it. It's not every day you craft a holy relic of Jackienism, after all.
Because if there's anything worthy of worship, this object would be it. No questions about it.
Speaking of possibly questionable substances and their great uses for the sake of advancing science by leaps and bounds, there's another little something like that, another resource in your garden still awaiting proper exploitation.
The Pixies you picked up near Viridis' old place have been spreading out throughout your garden, frequenting a handful of clearings that happened naturally when the forest grew out and parts of the soil weren't quite fertile yet, mainly the places where buildings used to stand before all these plants decided to take over. They mostly just dick around all day, as far as you're aware, unless Chuckie is around.
They may be hyperactive little shits, but even they had to learn quickly what happens when you fuckie with the Chuckie, which in their case involves being captured inside a turned-over glass so she can lecture them for half an hour.
Pixies have issues holding still for longer than two or three seconds at most. The torture is immense and you ended up cheering the ones that got punished like that up afterwards by sharing a couple of pieces of your chocolate with them. This emergency first aid was successful, even as the material price inherent to it was so high.
But to return to the matter of questionable substances… Pixie Dust, as Brian has informed you, has several interesting properties as a magical resource, if used correctly.
Even prior to being refined, it retains some of a Pixie's natural magic, allowing someone that were to, say, rub it over an object, to turn said object invisible. And turn it back by rubbing some more on it, too, for that matter.
That invisibility isn't permanent, sadly, which would be really damn handy, but still, that's something. Not as good as the refined version of Pixie Dust, though, which can cause short-lived, potentially (and momentarily) debilitating hallucinations on skin contact with most living beings, which might just be an idea you could run with.
It's also used as a psychoactive drug among the bottom rungs of magical society thanks to this property. Indeed, PD (or peedee), as it is commonly called, is fairly popular in some of the slums over in the Overcity city you sometimes frequent, now that you're thinking back, people imbibing the powdery liquid that looks like a swirl of colors to relax thanks to its low dosage.
Basically, it's the magical version of weed, except its more concentrated form can actually be useful for your own purposes. Not that you take drugs yourself- you always stayed away from that stuff, the worst you did was take a few puffs from a joint back in college and the experience was enough to turn you off of anything that screws with your mind ever since (you ended up vomiting so much)- but it might just be an option for non-lethal takedowns and ensuring the compliance of potential prisoners.
Or just to get Olivia addicted to Pixie Dust for shits and giggles. It would be absolutely hilarious.
Sadly, actually collecting the stuff is a tad bit more complicated. The good news is, it naturally builds up with and gets brushed off by the natural use of a Pixie's wings, not unlike how some monstrous moths generate, store and actively weaponize their own poisonous kinds of dust. Bad news, actually collecting the crap is kind of a pain and you only get a limited amount, so building up enough for any notable use means waiting a good bit.
At least you can leave the gathering to Chuckie, thanks to the special Dust Vacuum Brian built already. It only targets the desired variety of dust, ignoring all other stuff such as dirt, soil or similar that would otherwise very much complicate your scheme of free-range Pixie Dust farming.
…You wonder if it's any different from other kinds of Pixie ranching, and whether you could demand more money for it, market it as better, somehow. If it works with eggs, you don't see why it wouldn't work for this stuff, either.
Thinking deeply, you magically brain-lick the honey essence again. Yup, still kinda tasty even without tongue involved.
Ice Mana Conversion: While within environments that are rich in environmental Ice Mana, such as cold, snowy, iced-over places or similar, your Ice-Elemental spells may be discounted for up to 5 mana per cast, scaling with the density of Ice Mana you have access to (the colder it is, the bigger your mana discount)
You've decided that, after all the chaos, personality switches and general shenanigans of yesterday, you really should give yourself a break- more of a break than usual, that is- and make use of the opportunities and resources available to yourself, here at your most esteemed estate extraordinaire.
Or to put it another way, the part of your backyard that is constantly cooled down now, the trees siphoning warmth out of it after Viridis made them for some reason, has potential. One of the (many) things you read about in that one grimoire on the (overwhelmingly powerful) uses of Ice (best) magic was, after all, the potential applications of just existing within an environment rich in the proper type of mana.
Mana being both the natural magical background radiation that it is as well as the energy (or 'energy' at least, from what little you know of the magical scientific community its exact nature still is in dispute and all) that beings capable of using magic either generate on their own or else take from elsewhere somehow and process themselves in order to do what they do.
It's a whole thing and Brian is either unable or unwilling to explain the details to you, so you've just been ignoring that part of things for a while now. Stuff that directly messes with mana somehow isn't unusual, either, by the way, and you have seen something of that sort before.
The memory of that stupid antimagic cyborg-robot-thing Brian originally made as a simplified prototype still stings a little to this day. Mostly when you remember how it blew you the fuck up.
But yeah, some creatures just naturally disrupt or absorb environmental mana, it's a known quantity to find if you know where to look for them. In fact, you technically qualify for that description yourself, now that you've taken the first steps towards making environmental mana do what you want it to.
As it damn well should, given your absolute authority over all that is, was and will ever be. It's only so much you can do so far, willing the stuff to reinforce and bolster your spells when you cast them, which in turn only actually works when you have access to loads of actual Ice Mana already.
For the record, Ice Mana is the best kind of mana. Its taste is not as sweet nor invigorating as that of that honey essence, but it is by definition the best type, so its taste is logically the best as well.
Clear and crisp, with a note of freezing temperatures. You actually do kind of like it more the more you slobber over it with your magical brain-tongue.
When using your magic (the BEST kind of magic), you can kind of… draw it in, supplementing your own magical reserves with that you can pull from your surroundings. It's not much, not extremely so, but it does help.
In other news, you're also tinkering around with your old idea of the Pylons used to absorb mana, then convert it into the good kind of mana. Mostly to turn the things into icy bombs, but you can totally take the runic design scheme much further… With some experimentation and practice and all that.
You may end up blowing up a couple of heat-sapping trees, but honestly, that's a small sacrifice for the advancement of magical science involved.
Caroline wasn't exactly happy. She hadn't always been like that, but hey, stuff happened, she had a reason to not be happy, so it just made sense, right?
Like, first things were pretty alright. Her parents loved her, she could always screw with her loony little sister and the other bitches at school were just as bitchy as her. Not tooting her own horn, but she had it made all the way until graduation, which was when she'd have to look into college and a lifelong pile of debts or something.
Or fishing herself up a permanent sugar daddy, setting some cash to the side and financing the brat sister's college, because damn, she totally would be clueless about the real world.
Then the thing happened. With the thingy. The talking, walking ugly plush cat. It kept annoying her until she'd told it to piss off or be spayed, but apparently it was real enough of a plush toy to not have any balls to begin with so that one was a bust.
She'd eventually agreed to this apparent magical mascot's whole shtick, but only to get it off her back; Caroline figured once it understood that she absolutely, positively had no interest in its shit, it would buzz off and go find someone else to do the job, and told it as much.
Only, it turned out this little fuckwad was a stubborn sonuvabitch, and so two months in she realized she was going along with what it said just to get it to stop fucking showing up and waking her up in the middle of the night every two damn hours. For two weeks straight.
She'd tried killing it. Oh, how she'd tried. Nothing worked.
Summarizing the results, she may have accidentally killed a couple people by blowing up a car that was driving through the forest in the middle of the night (sorry not sorry, sleep deprivation was an even bigger bitch than Caroline was herself) and bad things happened that were never going to be brought up again, the end.
Literally, the end, because she died. Horribly. The way she did so may be related to the fact the first thing she did when she, against all expectations, regained consciousness, was to throw up her guts and everything in them. Repeatedly.
Which was pretty impressive, considering she didn't have anything in here, but that didn't stop her from heaving and coughing for ten minutes straight.
"A bit dramatic/stupendous/unnecessary, aren't we?"
It was what she figured some lovecraftian creature would sound like. Two dozen voices, all speaking in general unison yet also differing in intonation and tempo just enough to give her a headache if she tried to pay too much attention to it.
"Hey, you didn't choke on… a black pretzel?" She asked more than she said.
"Ah, yes, the Veil/Safety Measure/Glass Ceiling. No need to worry, the memories/recollection/facts shall sort themselves out soon enough." It chuckled, the lanky creature standing over her looking down at Caroline with way too many faces and way too many pitches for its laughter.
All of a sudden, she remembered that you couldn't spell 'slaughter' without 'laughter', and this thing was sus as fuck. "Alright, guess I'll leave the existential breakdown for later. The fuck're you and what's going on?"
"Oh, first deaths/young'uns/virgins are always so precious," it crooned in a way that she really, really didn't appreciate. Looking around for a second on the side- fuck, she was still in this damn forest? If this was what hell looked like, she was all for abandoning environmental protection of any kind, forever. "Rejoice! Your death/penalty game/disqualification has been revoked! A great evil has taken hold of this place, and you are the only one that can stop it!"
"Look, last time anyone gave me that kinda pitch, it really didn't turn out great. So unless you got a phone on you I can borrow to call a taxi or something-"
"It has taken your sister/sibling/fellow spawnling, by the way."
Caroline's eyes narrowed.
"Fuck it, tell me everything."
Going over a mental list of your holdings and appropriately loyal servants (most of them aren't loyal so much as they're using you just like you use them, but really, close enough for your purposes), you come up short when you try to complete a quick check of such things before bed.
You kind of had a feeling something was missing, and it's bothering you. So of course you have to think about it really long and really hard, to try and figure out what it is you're missing…
Tabitha is there and awaiting cuddles as usual. Chuckie is currently making her rounds around the garden, same as always there too. Mirasol has apparently been busy elsewhere lately, but you saw her during lunch- your gluttonous daughter's pregnancy is proceeding kinda quickly, by the by.
Her belly was big and round even before she started stuffing herself.
Whom does that leave? Brian is probably just being his usual jackass self doing science inefficiently somewhere, or else playing at some semblance of subtlety in case the Collector becomes a problem, after all. Hm…
Ah, you got it! You think. You haven't seen the anal demon in days now! Normally you can find her somewhere around the house when she isn't busy summoning more imps for the cannibal imp colony you've got going inside that mirror-fog-world subspace protecting your home like a barrier or something.
You should probably look into that. Where could she possibly be… You're pretty sure the contract you made her sign should ensure she can't just up and run or anything, unless you severely misunderstood a lot of things and Brian chose to ignore that.
Which is possible, but unlikely. Even before you came to an understanding the way you did, he didn't exactly cherish the thought of having a fleeing demon cause chaos and possibly come back to haunt both of you down the line.
So you're assuming anal demon's somewhere on your base, at least for the moment. Could she have gotten lost in the basement Brian dug out, especially after he renovated it in response to the audit?
As it turns out, kind of. There's a bunch of traps down here, as you already knew, but one of them seems to have decided to activate on the ass possessed by your pet demon.
Literally, as you find her inside a room that seems to be specially made to store intruders, suspended from the ceiling by a couple of mechanical arms. She's gagged, all her limbs are securely fixed in place and bound up behind her back.
Legs spread open widely, she greets your entrance with a lazy sound of acknowledgement of your presence, the natural lubrication she's been producing having built up into a small puddle on the floor that is constantly trickling down a vent nearby only to be maintained by her equally constant state of arousal.
"…Should I even do anything or just leave you in here?"