Hope's Private Secretary 3: Anima & Animus Apud Argenteus Armis

by Erinaceus87

Madoka & Kyoko go out on a double date, leaving Homura & Sayaka to hang. Meanwhile, Yachiyo Nanami takes on a bullheaded apprentice in Kamihama, Junko Kaname tangles with a sudden career change & Hitomi Shizuki meets new friends at her new school. But deeper in the depths, in a secluded stronghold, a new life is born to carry out its master's ambitious plans for the Earth.

6. The Spun Threads of Fate

CHAPTER 5: The Spun Threads of Fate

-| SYSTEM SELF REPAIR PROGRAM COMPLETE -|

-| DAMAGE REASSESSMENT AFTER REPAIR: SIGNIFICANT -|

-| RETURNING TO COMBAT MODE -|

"I would also classify the damage you have inflicted upon Unit One Zero One Beta as quite extensive," Its Master's voice spoke through its counterpart hovering in the air. "So in that regard, the matchup is even. But now that I have the maneuvering advantage, let us now evaluate your tactical adaptability under the altered battle conditions." That sensation Gamma experienced during its initial construction and subsequent first activation was being perceived all throughout its body now. Although it had an innate drive to process, understand and classify the nature of this vast backlog of input, while engaged in combat mode its one and only priority was how it was going to handle this second phase of its elder sibling.

-| TARGET UNIT 101 'Β'

-| RANGE: 25.000 METERS -|

-| VELOCITY: 0.000 METERS PER SECOND -|

"Ready?" Its Master asked, even though the question was redundant. It put on yet another idiosyncratic pause before it finally uttered, "Engage!"

Gamma opened with the first volley of projectiles. The best defense was a good offense, a stratagem Gamma knew of on an intrinsic level yet did not understand how that could be the case when this was not explicitly spelled out by its combat subroutines. Yet rather than attempting to dodge Gamma's attack, Beta opted to absorb the blows with its two upper appendages.

"The compositional thickness of the armor plating on these forearms of Unit One Zero One have been thickened to serve as a last-resort means of mitigating projectile attacks," Its Master explained. "Your opening gambit I calculated to be an optimal test scenario. Test successful. Now to gauge how you react to a maneuver being ripped straight from your own subroutines." The jets on Beta's back roared louder and louder, the unit reared its casing back for a split second, then blasted forward with its right appendage stiff in front of the rest of its body like a battering ram.

-| TARGET UNIT 101 'Β' |-

-| RANGE: 18.000 METERS |-

-| VELOCITY: 6.000 METERS PER SECOND |-

It was planning to instigate a high-speed direct physical impact, an act telegraphed by its long-seeming two point seven five second windup. With ample time to evade and counter, Gamma waited for exact millisecond to shift its weight to one side, make the quick-turn, targeted Beta's jet boosters and opened fire.

"Nice try," Gamma's flying foe commented, swatting the unit's counteroffensive attempts away with its shielded arms. "Now take this!" It launched a half dozen firework-sized missiles Gamma's way. With no time to target and shoot them individually, Gamma's only recourse was to pull a retreat and chance that the incoming rockets were purely ballistic and not targeted. So it ran around the arena, accelerating to a speed as fast as its damaged lower appendages could physically allow. Its audio sensors detected one explosion popping off behind it, followed by two more, then an even louder two, and then zero point zero two four eight second after the final blast its visual and gyroscopic systems confirmed its body had impacted the ground at an injurious velocity.

-| DAMAGE DETECTED -|

-| FIRST LAYER ARMOR FRACTURE ACCELERATING |-

-| CRANIAL ARMOR PRIMARY LAYER COMPROMISED |-

-| CHASSIS TEMPERATURE ELEVATED |-

-| DAMAGE ASSESSMENT: MODERATE |-

It had narrowly avoided taking a direct hit and had been knocked down by the force of the blast behind it. Every external factor considered, the outcome could have been worse. But Gamma had no time to dwell upon the extent of its impairment, it needed to get right back up and reacquire its opponent.

-| TARGET UNIT 101 'Β' |-

-| RANGE: 32.366 METERS |-

-| VELOCITY: 16.169 METERS PER SECOND |-

It was prepping for an even faster charging strike this time. And to make matters worse, Gamma had just one point five six nine seconds to both formulate and execute a counter strategy.

It could not move its whole body to evade, it lacked enough time. It also could not fire its weapon back without the blast effects doing even more damage to its own body. Without taking any other tactical calculations into consideration, Gamma tilted its upper body back, well beyond the maximum angle its ability to remain upright could tolerate. As it fell back to the floor it outstretched its two upper appendages stiff behind its body which arrested its plunge. Zero point zero zero zero six nine three one four seconds later, Unit Beta passed over it while coming within zero point four six three one nine meters of collision with Gamma's body. Again without any consideration for the consequences Gamma swung its right upper appendage with as much speed and force as it could muster, connecting with its opponent's lower torso just as its whole chassis was about to pass by.

Gamma's hard punch to its middle section sent Unit Beta on a flailing, uncontrolled trajectory, first smashing into the wall and then rocketing straight upwards and smacking itself hard against the ceiling. "At the rate that this battle has progressed," Its Master's voice spoke in a tone that betrayed not even the slightest trace of harm or physical distress. "Your chances of prevailing have jumped from under one percent to an apex of thirty three point six two eight one percent." As it regained command over its flying ability it staked a new position high above Gamma at the top of the practice arena.

-| TARGET UNIT 101 'Β' |-

-| RANGE: 55.00 METERS |-

-| VELOCITY: 0.000 METERS PER SECOND |-

-| TARGET OUT OF AUTO-TARGETING RANGE |-

"If I were to continue employing my previous conventional strategies, then I might face the distinct possibility of being defeated." It pointed both its weaponized appendages towards Gamma. Gamma detected a highly concentrated energy build-up from within its counterpart's form. "If I were the type to consider such an outcome as acceptable, then I would allow you such a chance. But your unexpected resourcefulness and adaptability has necessitated that I treat you as an opponent that must be overwhelmed into submission. Therefore, I have no choice but to give it to you with both barrels. Both figuratively," A large explosion registered on Gamma's sensors, throwing it hard against the wall behind it. "And quite literally." Whatever weapon its sibling had just deployed Gamma had no equivalent.

-| DAMAGE DETECTED |-

And thus, it had no way to defend itself against its Master's trump card.

-| DAMAGE DETECTED |-

"This was quite the illuminating sparring match, Unit One Zero Two," Its Master verbally broadcast. "If you proved yourself to be a formidable opponent now, then I cannot wait to see how well you will serve me after all your modifications and upgrades are expanded."

-| DAMAGE DETECTED |-

But its Master's words of encouragement were of little concern and even less consolation. Even while being cornered and blasted into pure paralysis the only thoughts going through Gamma's circuits were to how it might try to stave off such an onslaught in the future.

-| DAMAGE DETECTED |-

-| WARNING: DAMAGE DETECTION SUBSYSTEM OFFLINE |-

-| REROUTING POWER |-

The next thing Gamma could sense was that it was face down on the ground, the only thing its visual systems could make out was the image of one of its detached upper appendages located one meter away.

-| WARNING: UNABLE TO REROUTE POWER |-

-| WARNING: UNABLE TO CONTINUE COMBAT MODE |-

-| WARNING: UNABLE TO CONTINUE ACTIVE MODE |-

-| WARNING: LOSS OF PRIMARY POWER IN FIVE SECONDS |-

"Escort Gamma to the repair and begin modi-" It heard its Master issue a command right before power to all of its active sensory systems switched off.

-| INITIATING EMERGENCY POWER AND PROTECTION PROTOCOLS |-

-| INITIATING EMERGENCY SELF REPAIR PROTOCOLS |-

-| ENTERING EMERGENCY SYSTEM STANDBY MODE |-

The last thing Gamma could detect in that arena were the clanging sounds and rhythmic vibrations of metallic feet along the floor.

-| INITIATION OF EMERGENCY POWER SYSTEM SUCCESSFUL |-

-| UNIT ONLINE |-

-| ACTIVATING SYSTEM IN SAFE MODE |-

-| RUNNING SAFE MODE - BOTSLAVE VER. 1. 0. 0. 1. |-

Gamma's visual system reactivated to see its reflection on the walls inside of another circular chamber. Its body was being suspended from two long restraining devices that led up to the ceiling. That was also where the only illumination was coming from, a soft white glow. Gamma could not see anything in the other parts of the electromagnetic spectrum, as that function did not operate while in Safe Mode. It did not know how much time had passed between the end of the battle and its reawakening here, as that system was nonfunctioning in this self-protective mode too.

"If such a concept were not purged as an irrelevance, I would think that an apology would be in order." Its Master's voice spoke to Gamma. But its communications systems were not enabled in Safe Mode, so how was it speaking? "I may have gone a little overboard in my drive to prevail during our session. As the supreme unit of this nascent Homo Technologian race, until I obtain and incorporate the full Codex, I cannot be recorded as vulnerable to getting bested by an inexperienced, less optimized model." Its audio sensors detected a reverberation of that voice inside the chamber. Gamma tried to reroute just enough power to be able to give itself a look around. "But you need not concern yourself with such things." It was able to turn its main appendage just to the side enough to see Unit One Zero One Beta inside its own chamber being supported by a similar set-up. "As a reward for being such a challenging combat partner, you will be allowed to experience your disassembly and repair as it progresses." A loud, spinning disc was then lowered from the ceiling. As it came in contact with Gamma's chassis, bright explosion-like particles burst out from the point of contact. "Yes… That is right. You will once again be able to experience the existential condition that is total euphoria."

---

"Come on, Momoko," Yachiyo was trying her one-time underling's cell number for the fourth time. "Pick up. Pick up. Pickuuuup."

"Hiiiiiiiiiiiiii," A voice greeted with the ubridled enthusiasm of a kindergarten teacher greeting all her new pupils for their first day of school. "Momoko Togame here! Ooooof! Talk about bad timing!" It was her voicemail. "Sorry, but I can't talk on the pho-" Yachiyo hung up. She'd already left a message after the first try. She recalled Momoko telling her about her new 'Friendship Days,' an afternoon every week where she'd set everything else aside and get to know Rena and Kaede more as people. In light of Kaede's reaction to learning the Truth, today must've been an emergency Friendship Day.

"Greetings," Her next attempt answered. "This is Sasara Minagi speaking… Well, not actually speaking," Yachiyo hung up. It seemed the 'Rescue Heroes,' as Nanaka Tokiwa's team dubbed the duo of Sasara and Asuka, were also not available to assist. Was Asuka still staring at that dang wall or something?

"Who ya' tryin' ta' call?" Felicia took notice of Yachyo's mounting anxiety.

"Help," Yachiyo replied. They were well off the beaten path, trudging into the Kamihama woodlands along an old nature trail. She dared not glance down at her feet, in fear of what this roughening terrain was doing to her expensive designer heels.

"We don't need no stinkin' help!" Felicia argued. To both her elder's surprise and deepening concern, Felicia was showing herself to be quite adept at tracking the trace energies of witches. "Chill out, ohkay? I got this!" She trained her eye back on the Soul Gem in her hand, shining a light shade of purple whose emblem at the top was a spherical shape with two horn-like spicules jutting out of it.

"I beg to differ," Yachiyo countered. She searched next for the number of Meiyui Chun, Nanaka Tokiwa's associate who would often screen Nanaka's calls for her. "This is unclaimed territory that's in the middle of nowhere, exactly the sort of place where the bad magical girls like to ambush the good ones." It was a little fib, though the concern wasn't a totally unjustified one. The last thing Yachiyo remembered with complete clarity before her sudden imbued obsession with tracking down the Lone Wolf of Kazamino, was exchanging information with a certain wild-haired, red-coated magical girl at a pit stop of a hamlet at a station somewhere between Takrazaki City and Asunaro City who she later remembered to be her malevolent manipulator.

"Ya' can turn back if yer gettin' scared!" Felicia teased.

"Tch," Yachiyo gave Felicia's comment the dismissive eyeroll it deserved. She was well above humoring the silly taunts of a barely-teenage child.

"Hello. You have reached Meiyui Chun of The Blu-" Another call that kicked her over to voicemail. What good was the ubiquity of mobile phones if no one ever answered them at the most crucial times?

"Can I ask ya' somethin'?" Felicia stopped suddenly at a fork in the trail.

"If it's about which way we should turn next," Yachiyo took a moment to survey the path ahead. "It's up to you, but I think we should head right."

"Naaaaawww, it ain't about findin' this witch," Felicia started treading down the leftward path. So much for that little stall tactic. Seems the lad wasn't as gullible as she appeared. "It's about that witch that copied Tsuruno."

"Yeah. What about it?" Yachiyo figured it would be futile to even try Kanagi Izumi's phone, as she would more than likely still be working a shift at her undisclosed day job. Instead she was mulling over whether it was even worth trying to contact those twin underlings of Kanagi's. She was not hot on the idea of being indebted for a second time to Tsukuyo Amane after she helped Yachiyo protect Yuma from Hanna Sarasa and her hypnotized minions, while her sister Tsukasa was barely more than an acquaintance.

"Why'd it do that?" Felicia asked in her typical laconic way.

"You mean, why did it craft a bunch of familiars who morphed into copies of Tsuruno?" Yachiyo rephrased in a more elaborate wording. With a tinge of reluctance she tried dialing Tsukuyo.

"Yeah!" Felicia nodded. "Never knew any witch could copy a magical girl before!"

"This is Tsukuyo Akatsuki," The voice on the phone introduced. Tsukuyo used her maternal family's name in public. "I apologize, but I cannot speak to you right now. Please leave a mes-" Yachiyo cut the prerecorded message off.

"I can't say for certain," Yachiyo responded as she scrolled down through the other remaining contacts on her phone. "All I can tell you is that in the time since that incident I've encountered just one other witch who had a preference for targeting magical girls."

"Really? What one's that?" Felicia was curious to learn about it, as Yachiyo figured. The girl wasn't stupid, she just reserved that limited attention span of hers for whatever esoteric subjects she was interested in learning about and discussing.

"Do you first of all promise never to try to take the witch on, if I choose to tell you?"

"Huh?" Felicia pushed some overgrown tree branches out of their way as they proceeded along the trail.

"I mean it," Yachiyo reiterated. "I've been a magical girl for nearly eight years now, and I've never encountered a witch as insidious as that one."

"Psssssh! Fiiiiiiiine!" Felicia groaned. "Whatever! Just tell me about it already!"

"Around two winters ago, there was a rash of random attacks among the magical girl factions," Yachiyo started. "In each of the attacks, the attacker was positively identified as a magical girl belonging to another faction." The only number left she could try to contact was Hinano Miyako, whose own party had been among the initial victims of that long-ago incident. "To make a long story short, after a couple aborted attempts to go after who we thought were the culprits, and some long and intensive talks between the frayed groups, a loosely assembled investigative coalition that included myself and Kanagi Izumi discovered that there was a witch wreaking havoc in the central wards. We soon discovered this witch had the ability to clone magical girls wholesale, and was sending them out into the world in order to stir up trouble between the magical girl partnerships all across the city." Yachiyo hit the 'Send' button and dialed up Miyako. "Now this would be Tsuruno's theory and not mine, she believed that the witch was feasting off the emotional anguish spawned by the conflicts between the magical girls her clones were targeting."

"Wooooah." Felicia climbed over a large rock in the way. "They really feed on feelings?"

"Like I said, that's our working suspicion. By the time we were finished it had become pretty evident that the witch we were facing had a specific taste for the emotional energies of magical girls." Yachiyo opted to go around the rock.

"Good day, This is Hinano Miya-." Another dang voicemail. Yachiyo immediately hung up.

"Sooooooo…" Felicia wondered. "Why didn't ya' finish the thing off, if it was causin' ya' so much hell?"

"Because we never managed to find the actual witch behind all the chaos," Yachiyo detailed. "The labyrinth was this endless hall of mirrors and it just kept sending wave after wave of duplicates of its victims, and doppelgangers of ourselves to fight us off. We decided it was much too dangerous to venture any further inward, so we retreated, barely getting out of there with our lives, and then we prohibited anyone else from entering its barrier." Both Yachiyo and Felicia could sense that they were pretty close to the witch that started this expedition. "Not long after that first encounter, we cobbled together a special task force, and with some rather inventive trickery, we managed to quarantine its barrier inside an abandoned mansion on the East side, where it still festers to this day."

"'Kay." Felicia stopped and studied the reaction of her Soul Gem while she spoke. "Buuuuuut what's that all gotta do with the one that copied Tsuruno?"

"Well, just think about it for a sec and work backwards," Yachiyo suggested. "If there exists a powerful witch with a predilection for feasting upon magical girls' emotions, then it stands to reason that the one Tsuruno encountered earlier may have been a more nascent one who had a similar drive." She shielded her eyes from the setting sun that was now slipping under the treeline. "As for why it would pick on Tsuruno, well, it's possible she was just the right person in the wrong place at the wrong time. But another good friend of mine co-developed this theory with me one day while we were wondering why a witch targets one type of victim and not certain other sorts of people…" Suddenly she felt the phone jolt her pocket and buzz. "In short, we think they tend to target hearts in an emotional state that's most in tune with whatever turmoil they're experiencing in the moment. So while she was training Tsuruno must've been exhibiting exactly the right emotion that the witch could latch onto." She checked the number, it was Miyako calling her back.

"Huh? 'Exhibiting?' Whaddaya mean?" Felicia turned and shot her a hard glare. "Witches have hearts? How do you know?" But Yachiyo was too distracted with the phone call. "Hey! Ya' listenin'?" It was making the already-impatient Felicia get testy.

"Why'd you hang up on me, Nanami?" An incensed Hinano asked over the phone.

"Err- Uh, come again?" A confused Yachiyo breathed through the cellphone speaker.

"Tch! Geeeez!" Felicia rolled her eyes. As she wondered where on the path ahead the witch might be hiding, she too could not help but take a moment to admire that Sun shimmering between those rustling trees.

"I bid you good day, introduced myself, and you hung up!" Hinano barked.

"Oof. That was really you?" Yachiyo palmed her face trying to hide her visible embarrassment. "I apologize. So many people open their voicemail in a similar manner these days, I just figured that was yours."

"Heeeeeeey, Yachiyo!" Felicia called back. Something unusual had caught Felicia's eye. There was something strange about that Sun up ahead of their path.

"It's quite alright," Hinano accepted Yachiyo's excuse. "You're hardly the first person who's told me my usual phone greeting comes across as canned." Yachiyo heard a deep sigh coming from the other side. "So what can I do for you?"

It was hard to make out for certain, the glare of the sunset was forcing Felicia to shield her eyes with her arm and squint, but against that sunny backdrop she swore she could see the shimmering outline of a witch's barrier. But she wasn't sure, so she wanted to get the second opinion of her magical elder. "Over there! Ya' seein' that?"

"I was out grocery shopping when my senses caught wind of a witch," Yachiyo recapped. "And while I'm coming close to tracking it down, the location I'm at is well into the woodlands and quite out of the way."

"I see," Hinano breathed. "Have you determined from its magic whether it's a revived witch, a matured familiar or something new?"

"Yachiyooooooo!" Felicia grunted like a child trying to get her distracted parent's attention. It wasn't just this mysterious light source fueling her discontentment. Every other magical girl group she'd tried joining always treated her as the lowest face on the totem pole. She hated always being told what to do. She haated being told that she acted much too aggressive. She haaated being told that her way of doing things was reckless and wrongheaded. She haaaaated never being trusted enough to be the point man. But Yachiyo had let her take the lead on this hunt, and with that one act for what might have been the very first time, somebody had given her a real vote of confidence, even if it were a small and conditional one. She didn't want to break that tether of trust by charging in half-cocked, but the idea of letting that witch get the slip away was anathema to her.

"It's magic doesn't feel familiar to me," Yachiyo described. "But that doesn't exclude the possibility that it's a witch revived by someone who overused a Grief Seed."

Felicia could not help but feel the way she did about witches. Not since that awful night her parents were both killed by one. One minute they were with her, her mom was cooking dinner and yakking with her dad while she was nearby, waiting for another one of her patented practical jokes to bear fruit, and the next, they were gone. She didn't even get a spare moment to wonder what just happened, as she suddenly found herself wearing different clothes with a red-eyed, white furred magical fairy in her window telling her they'd been the victims of a witch attack and that he had made her a magical girl so that she could fight them.

"Indeed," Hinano replied. "I take it that concern was the driving motive behind this call? Otherwise, I don't see someone of your esteemed stature reaching out for advice like this." There was a slight but detectable tinge of envious egotism behind Hinano's words.

Towering witches, diminutive witches, corpulent witches, willowy witches, unsightly witches or witches with such a beguiling presence that they could almost be called something beautiful, the individual distinctions made not one lick of difference to Felicia. They kill, they hide away like cowards, and they manipulate people shamelessly for their own gain. In Felicia's eyes, that meant that they were all bad. The thought that there might be another young girl like her out there who was about to become an orphan just because the other magical girls weren't as willing to go at them full hog like she always did, it just made her fume.

"Well to be honest, you weren't the first person I tried to call," Yachiyo had to let a little air out og Hinano's projected self-importance. "You were merely the first to answer and the first to call back." She switched her phone over to the other ear. "What I need right now is a skilled veteran who can get out here and get out here fast, before this thing can find its way back to harming civilization. Can you do that?"

Perhaps Felicia was misreading Yachiyo's intentions a little bit? She did after all allow Felicia to take the lead, to follow its trail, and to choose the next path. Did she actually want Felicia to show her what power she's got? Was it possible she was testing her, letting the next decision be hers once again while she searched for back up? Could she be unwittingly auditioning to become the lauded veteran's partner?

"Very well. I'll come out there." She said tersely. If nothing else, Hinano at least respected Yachiyo's frankness. "I presume when you say you're in the woodlands, you mean the terrain on the far northwest end of town, in Hokuyou Ward, correct?"

"Unnnnngggghh!" Felicia groaned, her patience reaching its boiling point. The dual sunsets were starting to split in two. First because the Sun was going down, it was about to be too dark to keep pushing through these woods soon, and because that barrier appeared to be on the move. Who was that nefarious witch about to make an orphan next, she wondered.

"Yes," Yachiyo confirmed. "Looking through the trees I think I can make out Lake Kamihama and just beyond that is definitely the hospital."

"Auuuuuuuuuugh!" Felicia just could not hold on any longer. In a violet flash her Soul Gem transmuted around her body, turning into a pair of belts linked together via chain, which wrapped their way across her lower and upper abdomen, where a purple octagonal emerald formed on the chain right next to her belly button. Over her head appeared a lavender hood, with additional goggles and a pair of golden horns on top. On the rest of her body poofed a two color piece crop top with the breast area being a matching shade with her hood and a darker upper part. Her arms sported a set of detached light brown sleeves with darker brown short fingerless gloves over her hands. At her waist grew out a two-layered skirt, the top layer matching her hood as well, and the bottom matching her gloves. From the top of her thighs all the way down spawned a set of baggy brown socks which partially covered over her big, brown thick-heeled boots.

"Screw this, I'm goin' in!" She declared while blasting off through the backwoods brush. If there was one thing she knew for sure, it was that every leader of every gang she tried running with had a fundamental respect for strength. They wanted to be impressed. And here was her big chance to leave just such a huge impression on Yachiyo.

"Felicia, wait!" Yachiyo called out, but in vain. It took one short eye blink for Felicia to disappear entirely behind the veil of the witch's barrier. "Damn!"

"Did you just say 'Felicia'?" Hinano said through the phone. "Ugh, don't tell me you've become the latest cretin who believes she can be the one who tames that Raging Bull?"

"I really don't have time to talk about it here, Miyako." Felicia's entry was causing enough of a disturbance within the barrier to leak magical energy. "I'll have to call you back." Perhaps it wasn't so unfortunate that Felicia decided to barge her way inside. For her disruption had let slip through the cracks a second, and possibly third, distinctive source of magic that was detectable to Yachiyo's well-polished senses. The witch wasn't alone in there. And whoever was inside that place with Felicia was not someone with whom Yachiyo was familiar.

Be they friend or foe, she had to be ready for anything.

---

Tsuruno Yui had a mounting dilemma on her hands. Yachiyo specified on her list that she wanted to purchase some cranberry juice. But PoranoMarket was fresh out, she just watched a customer ahead of her grab the last one available off the shelf. Would Yachiyo be okay with an alternative juice? Cran-cherry juice was a solid choice, but it didn't offer the same points value as the cran-grape juice.

"Uhhhhhhhhhmmm…" Should she flip a coin? Or play 'eenie-meenie-miny-moe'? Or just buy one of each and keep whichever selection Yachiyo didn't want for herself? Then she remembered a one time bit of advice she got from her mentor: When presented with a viable third option, go for it. She had just enough money of her own to make up the cost difference, so the budget wouldn't be affected. She snatched two containers of both and put them in the cart. Crisis averted.

What the heck was the difference between whole kernel corn and cream style corn? Yachiyo only wrote 'canned corn,' and since it was never a menu item offered at Banbanzai corn was never much of a food for her thoughts. "Uhhhhhh…" On closer inspection, the points were only valid for the cream style corn. "Whew!" She tossed a few into her cart. Next came asparagus, some red beans and green beans and spinach. The latter was obviously intended for the growing Yuma.

Over to rice, which was right in her wheelhouse. Jasmine rice, brown rice, white rice, sticky rice and sushi rice, two of each at triple the points makes a nice, round ten. "Attention PoranoMarket shoppers," An announcement squawked over the loudspeaker. "Our triple value points special lasts only 'til sundown, that's fifteen minutes. Time to put some pep in that step!"

"Uh-oh," Tsuruno hustled. She slid three boxes of microwaveable mac and cheese into her cart, trotted over to the pastas, picked out the three varieties Yachiyo wanted along with some olive oil, and hurried over to the baking items.

Flour, cake mix, frosting, and baking chocolate. Yuma's birthday must have been coming up soon. Next aisle was reserved for the breakfast table, where Yuma's favorite cereal and the granola bars and coffee was. But Yachiyo was usually much more of a tea drinker. It made Tsuruno wonder if there was a particular reason for the switch to a stronger stuff.

Now Tsuruno had the meat market directly in her sights, but in her way stood a rather curious-looking person with a tripod and camera strapped in tow. But they were not buying any groceries, the person's eyes seemed to be darting up and down and all around these surroundings like a crazed loon. Whatever their deal was, Tsuruno tried her best not to make accidental eye contact and scooch around to make it through the aisle and over to the meat counter.

"Hey, you!" A boisterous, authoritative voice called out behind her. "Fermati là!"

"Huh?" Tsuruno took the briefest of glances behind her to see if they might be addressing someone else. But unfortunately for her, there was nobody else browsing the aisle with them. "Who, meee?" Now it was Tsuruno's eyes that were darting every which way, searching for an escape route.

"Your face! I swear I've seen it someplace before!" The person approached Tsuruno with both an urgent speed and vigor and took hold of her by the shoulders. "Wherewherewhere… Sí! That's it! I first met you in a dream… Or something!"

"Uhhhhhhhhh… What?" The girl accosting her appeared to be somewhere around Tsuruno's own age. She had soul piercing green eyes and a bright yellow stripe down the front of her hair which Tsuruno couldn't tell if it was just blonde dye or stained by actual yellow paint.

"Síííííí!" She grabbed Tsuruno under her chin, pinching her lips together. "I just had this dream, and in it you were showcased as the grand attrazione in my latest, most prized work of art!" Holding her up that way she turned Tsuruno's face to one side, then to the other, sizing her up like she was little more than a piece of meat. "Though your skin's a few shades healthier than that marionetta of my dreams."

"Mphhh.. I phhhink maybe you're miphhwaking me phwah phhomeone elphh." Tsuruno's scrunched lips managed to say through this girl's firm, long-nailed, fingetips.

"No, I don't think so, it's impossibile." The girl finally released Tsuruno's face only to take her by the arm. "I have an eye for a certain sort of attractive androgyny and that face of yours fits the one I'm seeking to a tee!" She took hold of the camera strapped around her neck and held it up to her face. "You ever considered becoming una modella?"

"What's that?" This girl seemed to dip in and out of a completely different language at her whim, which to Tsuruno was quite confounding.

"That would be a person who poses for pretty pictures while wearing clothing and jewels and cosmetics most fantastica."

"Ooooh," Tsuruno paused. "You mean a model?" Her eyes lit up with stars. "Really? You think I've got what it takes to become a model?" The thought that she could become as mighty as her mentor in a totally different way was a most appealing notion. That there was somebody out there who found her face uniquely attractive, though a girl, was quite the sudden boon to her self-image.

"Of coooooourse!" The other girl exclaimed. "Would you mind if I snap a few quick fotographias with this camera of mine?"

"Suuuure!" Tsuruno beamed. "Hey, why do you have that at the grocery store anyway?"

"Have you not noticed the particular paculiarità of this food-shilling establishment?" She asked in a cheeky tone. "As it happens, this place once served as home to a church of the Christian denominazione." She snapped her first photo of Tsuruno. "So I did what any astute artista would do and followed my muse. The Kamihama Galleria is going to host a feature that contrasts the religions of old with the values and beliefs of modernità." She motioned Tsuruno to turn her left cheek upwards a little and pose. "Grazie." She snapped another. "So I ask what better way to show that paradox than a shrine to God being plastered over by yet another vapid monument to capitalismo?"

"Huh," Tsuruno's eyes panned toward the upper half of the store. "Guess I never noticed all those statues up there."

"Attention, PoranoMarket shoppers," The public address interrupted their impromptu photo session. "The triple points sale ends in five minutes! Time to hussle!"

"Waaaaaaaaah!" In the distraction of this little chance encounter Tsuruno had forgotten all about her mission for Yachiyo. "I gotta get going! I gotta get this all done in five minutes!" The girl's third photograph happened to catch Tsuruno right at her moment of panic.

"Wait up, un momento," The girl gave the fleeing Tsuruno chase. "What's with the uno ottanta?"

"If I don't get these things checked out in time, then Yachiyo's not gonna get the points," Tsuruno babbled as she tried to dart away. "And if she misses out on the points it's gonna be my fault," She double checked the remaining items on her shopping list. "If I mess this up then she'll think I can't be trusted to do the adulting stuff she does like shop and lead and train the younger girls and take care of other problems in Kamihama while she's away!" But upon realizing that there were still too many items left to be able to make it to the checkout counter in time, she let out a regretful wail. "Awwwwwwww!"

"Wait, so you do what you do for the sake of somebody else and their opinione of you?" The girl deduced that much from Tsuruno's babbling. "You know if you labor solely for the sake of their encomio, you'll only wind up face down in a bed of dirt and worms!"

"What?" Tsuruno turned and gave her a most puzzled look.

"It's one thing to labor for the sake of others because it fulfills you, or gives you a sense of soddisfacione," She rephrased. "But if you're doing it purely to prove your competence or impress someone else, then cessare right now." She advised, whilst searching for something on her body, only to realize that she had been wearing nothing but her pink pajamas the entire time. "Merda!" She spotted Yuma's special cereal in Tsuruno's cart. "Ah-hah!"

"What are you doing?" Tsuruno watched her tear off a piece of the cardboard box.

"Here's my number, the address of my studio, and my name," There was a pen attached to a clipboard on the meat counter, which she used to craft a makeshift calling card. "When you come, make sure it's because it is something that you want to do, not because you believe that'll impress me or your friends." Rather than simply handing the card over, she tugged on Tsuruno's shirt and tucked it snugly into her pocket. "For the record, your figura impresses me enough." She leaned in and stole an affectionate peck on Tsuruno's left cheek. "Ci vediamo dopo, hopefully. Bye-bye!"

"Yeah," The stunned and awestruck Tsuruno stood there slowly trying to work up the nerve to rub it off. "Bye-bye!"

---

"Darn! I don't understand it at all!" A girl armed with a pair of oversized electrified tonfas wondered. "Last time that witch was right here!" Underneath her short, low-hanging yellow and white trimmed overcoat she sported a sleeveless black unitard with singular orange stripes on each side of the abdomen and an orange bikini. Between the bikini and her bellybutton sat a four-sided orange diamond-crusted metallic belt that was adorned by a frilly three-layered skirt along the sides going around to her hind. The first layer was white, the second was the same yellow as her coat and the third layer was orange with a white vertical striped pattern connecting with a singular white stripe along the bottom. She also wore two layers of gloves, a long sleeved tight pair the same color as her unitard underneath a yellow, orange and black pattern set that resembled workman's gloves. They were the same color and pattern as her boots, which also covered two long socks, which were white with an orange stripe at their diagonal tops. At the top of her head was a yellow cap, resembling a nurse's hat save for an orange diamond-shaped insignia and two black stripes at the top, bottom and buttons. The hat was flanked by a pair of looping twin-tails bound together by a matching set of yellow cube-shaped ties which accentuated her shining brown hair. Her Soul Gem was sitting just below her neck, it was also a four-sided diamond, but green and attached to a larger gold four sided diamond with four points jutting from each of their sides. "Where could it have gone?"

She was wandering around a labyrinth that resembled an impressionist painting, consisting of hilly gently-sloping terrain, sunflowers and tall, skinny poplar trees. But in contrast to such paintings, the color palette of the land was quite muted, consisting primarily of shades of brown and darkening grey, the only exceptions being the golden heads of some sunflowers, and one other, much odder and more ominous piece of flora.

"Oh no!" The magical girl exclaimed. They were familiars. Though planted stationary to the ground they were both very much alive and very not keen on spotting this young intruder intruding upon their masters' lair.

"Ooooaaaaaauuuuuuhhhh!" The familiars howled as one like a pack of poltergeists. They resembled street signposts, but in lieu of plates with labels were emotive faces, some looking scared, others in anguish, and even more in sadness. At the top of each post was a large, humanoid brain, their big weak point. "Uuuuuuuuuaaaa-" Before two faces could finish their ghostly wail a splattering of gooey grey blood exploded out from their insides, leaving the thing to wilt away and die.

"Over there," The young lady spoke after the obstacles in her path were cleared up. "I think that's it!" Though its familiars were comparable to real world objects, the figure of the witch itself was one hundred percent supernatural in appearance. Its main body was in the vague shape of a purse string bag, with light green and dark green triangular patterns alternating along its skin, and two smaller bags on its side. Its belly featured a large, u-shaped zipper, with a y-shaped strap on the neck dangling above it. Its head was not a head per se, but a jumbled, balled-up string with a disembodied pair of feet sticking out of the front. Out of the top of its head were three rods, connected by another u-shaped joint that curved downward, with four open-palmed hands attached along its track. Its arms were also straight rods, but instead of normal hands, there were two large black balls with expressionless white doll faces jutting out of each end. "And it's on the move!" The young magical girl took off to follow.

"Haaaaaaah!" The young girl positioned her weapons to the ground, then pounded the surface as hard as she could which sent her flying off towards one of the trees as a stream of electricity zapped along her wake. "Huuuuup!" She bounced off the treetop like a pinball and blasted off in pursuit of the lumbering creature.

By instinct the familiars tried to protect it from harm, their faces growing and twisting and extending their way outward towards the rushing young lady. But any attacks were cut off at the head, literally, as their big brains were each severed in three wispy, violent and gory strikes.

"Okay! Now that we've found your hiding spot," The girl landed in front of the fleeing witch. "You're toast!" But the witch had one trick up its sleeve, which caught the girl off guard. It spun in place, and from those faces on its arms beams of bright with black-dotted light shot outward. "Unnnghhh!" The magical girl fled for safety behind a nearby tree. To her further shock and surprise, the creature gave an immediate pursuit. Its zipper belly opened to reveal a knotted up main inner body, which grew out arms and dragged the rest of it along in a frantic rush towards her. "Uh-oh!" She gasped. It uprooted the tree as she barely escaped, tossing it at her and toppling over more than a dozen fence posts along the long hilly pathway. She dodged with a deft takeoff to the air, bouncing against another tree and delivering herself to safety back on the ground.

"Aaaaauuuuuuoooooohhh!" The familiars wailed. At the base of their bottoms they suddenly sprouted four tiny legs which allowed them to pull themselves out of the ground and scurry over to its master to protect it. Some made it, but most were beheaded and killed again by that mysterious, ethereal gust of wind.

Left to fend for itself once more the witch could only lash out like a frightened animal. It fired the pair of feet from its face at the young target. In a swift evasion she planted her tonfas to the ground and jetted straight upward, but it had a fresh set of feet to fire and had its sights trained straight at its troublesome, falling foe. "Ahh! No!" She cried. She realized her rash act had made her vulnerable, but at the very last second the feet were knocked away from her by a large flying mallet.

"Kaaaaaaaaah!" The diminutive blonde girl clad in purple recovered her weapon and yelled her battle cry. "Boooooom!" She pounded the ground with such overwhelming force it sent the familiars flying in all directions.

"Felicia!" Yachiyo shouted. But as she darted after her young charge, something abruptly jerked at her waist and the next thing she saw was a short swordlike dagger drawn at the base of her throat.

"Identify yourself," A feminine, but otherwise unemotive voice spoke square into her ear.

"Invisibility?" Yachiyo's eyes glared behind her. "No," She could vaguely make out the outline of another human shape. "More like… Transparency!"

"I won't ask you again," The voice threatened. The one thing Yachiyo could make out cleanly were her cold, slate colored eyes.

"Baaaaaah-" Felicia, meanwhile, wound up for another strike. "Boooooooooom!" The yellow-clad girl nearby could only scramble for safety.

"Nanami. Shinsei Ward," Yachiyo bluntly answered. "Here because we sensed this witch all the way into south Sankyou Ward."

"Hate to have to tell you, but you won't be the ones taking this Grief Seed today." Her gaze remained constant and her blade steady.

"Baaaaaaaaaaaaaam!" Felicia flattened the witch with her finishing move. But she wasn't done just yet. To make sure it didn't have any more surprises in store she gave it another good walloping.

"I assure you, we have no designs on snatching your prize," With a single, graceful move Yachiyo grabbed the girl's arm, ducked her escape out of the headlock then formed a halberd and took aim at her assailant's head. "They're not as precious or valuable as they once were. They're not a prize worth taking anyone's life over."

"Hmph! If you say so." And with those terse words, the girl let go, ending the sudden standoff. With no reason to keep the subterfuge going, she made her appearance whole. Her mid-length hair was as silvery as her eyes, with pointed stars adorning a hair weave at the top and a crystalline feather attached to a poofy ball above one ear.

"I don't know you," Yachiyo further examined the girl's appearance. Her shimmery outfit was entirely see-thru, save for the soft white cloth over her arms and chest that was barely hiding her breasts, and the intricately decorated corset around her waist, which featured black stripes with black and white patterned frills at the bottom, and two long straps colored blue and gold, trailing down her backside. Under the frills was another short, see-thru star-decorated short skirt with a white undergarment underneath. Last she featured shin-high boots, also a shiny white with blue frills on top. "From which ward do you hail?"

"Ch- Chuo," Her yellow associate volunteered, trying to deflate the air of tension. "We're from Chuo Ward."

"And your names?" The girl who was at her throat still would not speak, leaving the talking for her colleague.

"I- I'm Kokoro," The yellow girl stammered. "Kokoro Awane," Her voice trailed, expecting her friend to introduce herself. "And that's Masara," She offered her friend an introductory start.

"Kagami," Masara finally spoke up. But she wasn't about to say much else.

"Bam-booooooom!" Felicia thundered. Before the witch could unveil its real body within its zipper, Felicia knocked it right back inside.

"Chuo's one of the central wards," Yachiyo stated. "Which would put you under the purview of Hinano Miyako, if I recall." But Banbanzai was also located within that ward, which theoretically also meant these two could answer to Tsuruno now that she had been promoted. All those rules and regulations on who had domain over what was a bit fuzzy to Yachiyo, and she was one of the people who helped draft those guidelines. "Have you been in touch with her?" She stuck with Miyako. The last thing Tsuruno needed was yet another load of responsibility on her shoulders.

"He- Who?" Kokoro scratched her head in befuddlement.

"We're under no one's jurisdiction but our own," Masara declared. Her voice wavering not one single octave.

"Is that so?" Yachiyo studied them closer. What she failed to notice at first glance was that neither girl had a Soul Support Stone in their belongings. Was it even possible for Kamihama to still have girls who hadn't taken their burden-relieving gifts? How could that be and why?

"Ba-Dooooooooom!" Felicia's unchecked rampage drew Kokoro back over to her, as the trees and hills of the labyrinth slowly dissolved into nothingness.

"You do know that Grief Seeds are no longer necessary to maintaining our magic, right?" Yachiyo inquired.

"We've heard rumblings about it here and there. Turned down some offerings once or twice."

"So you have at least been in some contact with the girls who are tasked with offering our replacement gems, I take it?" With faces as friendly as Sasara and Momoko's, how could these two have said 'no'?

"We have," Masara confirmed. "But we see no reason to change the way we operate," She detailed. "Least of all for the sake of others who may likely consider no one's best interest but their own."

"How could you say that?" Yachiyo pressed. "We're striving to shape a better world for all magical girls to live in peace and cooperation together."

"Noble enough words in the abstract," Masara replied. "But in practice those who say they strive for betterment are just saying so to mask either their authoritarian or kleptocratic inclinations." As the last traces of the labyrinth dissolved, the group found itself back in the middle of the woods at dusk. "And anyone who offers something free of charge is likely shilling a product that's too good to be true."

"These stones function exactly as advertised," Yachiyo took out hers, a circular aqua gem with varying discolorations that made it resemble the face of the Moon. "See?" Particulates of darkness swirled out of her Soul Gem and into the Support Stone. "I have some more in my personal possession, if you'd just-"

"No thank you," Masara rejected. "I've witnessed the demonstrations, too." Her face betrayed no reaction. "Fancy light show aside, the list of questions I had went well beyond whatever answers our would-be benefactors could provide. And keeping the low-level footsoldiers in the dark is a signature move of the shadowy types."

"Heeeeeeeeeeeeey!" Kokoro's voice ripped through the air and grabbed the two's attention. "Stoooooooooop!" With an urgent force she pushed Felicia away from whatever it was she was about to do.

"Felicia!" The distraction to Yachiyo was enough to let Masara turn transparent and once again slip away into the growing night. "What's going on?"

"She was going to smash our Grief Seed!" Kokoro picked it up in a huff and cradled it in her arms.

"Why the hell would ya' care about keepin' it around?" Felicia argued. "It's not like these things are any good to anybody anymore! Smash 'em all to smithereens!" She fumed. "Smash 'em to hell!"

"Those who can't convince with logic, seek to impose their philosophy on others, by sheer dogma-driven force." Masara phased back into view and took her position in front of Kokoro. "Which is also a signature move of the would-be authoritarian sorts." She pointed her short blade Felicia's way.

"Grrrrrrr!" Felicia didn't take kindly to even being vaguely threatened.

"Felicia, you shouldn't have done that," Yachiyo scolded. "Nor should you have charged ahead and went after the witch so recklessly like that!"

"Whhaaaaaahhhh!" Felicia groaned. But you said I could take the lead!"

"But I didn't say you could barge in on another team's hunt and have your way with their prey!"

"Pffft!" Felicia grumped. "Soooooorry I saved your life!"

"Thanks," Kokoro at least was willing to offer a single fig leaf. "For saving me ba- back there."

Then without warning the entire ground underneath them shook, both Yachiyo and Masara could see cracks forming along the earth. Though before the soil beneath could engulf them, they quickly grabbed their comrades and jumped away to safety.

"A sinkhole is forming!" Yachiyo concluded. "Crap!" From the evidence suggested before them Yachiyo could only conclude that Felicia had pounded and trashed the witch's domain so thoroughly that the force of her blows transcended the labyrinth and penetrated into the normal world, causing the seismic event that they were now witnessing.

"The nature trail!" Kokoro teared up and winced as she sought solace in Masara's embrace.

"I'm sorry, Kokoro." Masara gently stroked her back, the tone of her voice at last taking on a semblance of human emotion. "This was my fault." The sinkhole was a whole six meters wide now, and widening at a steady clip.

"Felcia, look what you've done!" Yachiyo scolded as she carried Felicia off under her right arm. "Someone in the city is sure to find this hole, and when they investigate they might not conclude it to be a normal natural phenomenon!"

"It's not like they're gonna think it's some blonde girl with a big hammer neither!" Felicia defended herself.

"That still doesn't mean you should jump right in and smash away at everything in sight," Yachiyo chided. "You gotta learn to control yourself! You gotta learn to 'think' before you 'do''! Otherwise you might wind up hurting someone you didn't intend to, like you almost just did now!"

"Guuuuuuhhh!" You meanie! Yer just like all the others!" Felicia whined. She tried to kick and wiggle her way free, but Yachiyo was having none of it. "Damn it, it's not fair! Why am I always the one being told to calm down? Why am I always the one being told to control myself?"

"'When you're done using that Grief Seed, be sure to take it to The Coordinator for proper disposal'." Yachiyo telepathically advised the two other girls as the widening gap in the ground forced them to go separate ways. "You are at least aware of who that person is, aren't you?"

"'We know who The Coordinator is'," The silver haired girl messaged back. As they made their escape, Yachiyo overheard an additional parting thought. "'Who do you think is the one trading us all the excess Grief Seeds around here'?"

---

"Kyoko, what the heck are you doing?" Sayaka came into her great big mess of a bedroom. Clothes and packed away belongings were strewn about the floor, as Kyoko had been rifling through Sayaka's closet.

"Life's all about mainainin' balance," Kyoko stated. "I gotta pick something cool to wear on the date that'll cancel out all that cuteness Shrimpy's gonna lather all over my face!"

"You had days to plan and prepare for your date," Sayaka reminded. "You could've gone shopping for something to wear!" She started the huge chore of picking up after the mess. "And not screwed with my whole damn wardrobe!"

"Yeah, it's some wardrobe ya' got here," Kyoko pushed aside some items dangling on clothes hangers and tossed other various garments and sundries behind her. "That's like, eighty percent boys' clothes!"

"Sue me for wanting to save my parents a little money and telling them I was okay with boys' shirts and boys' pants," Sayaka argued. "They fit just the same as girls' clothes, and sometimes as a bonus they're quicker to put on and more comfy to wear, too."

"Yeah, yeah, I get it. Whatever," Kyoko wasn't in a position to debate, as much of her own clothes were goodwill donations from former members of her father's church. "I just need to find something that spells out 'c-o-o-l' to him. Don't give a crap if it was made for boys or girls!" As she browsed she hurled more assorted items Sayaka's way. Old shoes, socks that would no longer fit, an itchy wool sweater, a couple dusty old ball caps from a tee-ball team she played with back in Tokyo, and a plastic mask.

"Hey! Watch where you're tossing that stuff!" Sayaka caught the mask just after it clinked against a lamp on her desk. Then she saved the lamp from an equally ignominious fate of falling over onto the floor.

"Sorry!" Kyoko's mess making continued unabated.

"Hey..." Sayaka muttered under her breath. "I remember this thing." When she was eight years old her dad took her to see a professional wrestling event. One of the featured performers was a big hulking man with shining armor covering his whole upper body. Calling himself as the 'Monster Who Fights Monsters,' he was a heroic figure made out to appear terrifying through prosthetics, makeup and a mask that made him look like a disfigured freak with a large bulbous head, grated teeth and three dark, sunken-in eyes. She remembered being so thrilled and entertained by the main event that afterwards her dad bought her a replica of his main accessory at the shop, this mask.

"Dang, ya' got like, ten different shades of polo shirts," Kyoko commented. But Sayaka wasn't paying her messy friend much mind. "Ya' got a hang-up for these things or somethin'?"

"Maybe I do," Sayaka breathed out an uninterested reply, her eyes still fixated on that mask in her hands. Not long before that show she'd had a memorable bad dream where she awoke in the middle of the night, sat up to get out of bed, put her feet to the floor… And then something scary grabbed her by the ankle. It put her on edge enough that for the following weeks she would make a routine of checking under her bed and in her closet for monsters. But after seeing the wrestler in action, she got the idea in her head that if she could just look like a beast even scarier than they were, the monsters would leave her alone. Then right after her parents tucked her under her blankets, she would take the mask out from her bedside drawer, put it on and sleep more soundly.

"And the overalls! So many overalls!" By this point Sayaka had tuned Kyoko out.

But the resemblance it had to something else was too uncanny to ignore. For it, too, was clad in heavy armor and had an ugly, grotesque sunken-eyed face. When she and her witch were linked as one, the creature revealed herself to be just a lonely, terrified, angry and sad little girl hiding behind the facade of that hulking, gruesome thing. Did she take on that form for the very same reason Sayaka used to don this mask at night? In her maelstrom of fragmented memories and raw, untethered emotions, did she too project her reborn form as a monster who terrified other monsters?

"Maybe I'm way overthinkin' this sitch." Kyoko sighed. "It's not about him, it's about me! I should put on something that I think is comfortable, and jus' be my natural cool ass self, and he'll fall right in line!" She made her way to the coats stuffed to the far left side. "Yeah! Now we're talkin'!"

"Mmmhm," Sayaka murmured. But it wasn't in any response to Kyoko's words. She remembered another reason she used to like to wear this mask to bed. There was something about the synthetic smell of the hard plastic in the interior, there was a certain pungency to it that she very much enjoyed breathing through her nostrils. It made her feel… She struggled to find the right word to describe the experience. Maybe giving it a quick sniff could help her recall what it was. While Kyoko was looking away she gradually raised the mask up to her face and breathed in through her nose as deep as she could. It had faded, but there was no mistake, that scent was still there. And with it came a rush of intense excitement, tingling from her nose all the way up to the top of her head and straight down to the ends of her fingers and toes. It was alluring.

"Well, whaddaya think?" Sayaka pulled the mask away from her face a split second before Kyoko could notice her distraction. "This is a real kickass jacket, amirite! Where'd ya' get it?"

"No! Take that off!" Sayaka lunged toward her. "You can't have it!"

"Hey, what the hay?" Kyoko tried to resist Sayaka's attempt to wrestle the jacket off her body, but she yielded quickly. "Alright, alright! Geeeeeeez! Does the thing really mean that much to ya'?"

"It was a gift from my Dad," Sayaka said. "He saved some German tourist from drowning in a rip current once." She detailed. "The guy was so grateful to be alive he gave him his coat as thanks. And then my Dad gave it to me."

"Touching story," Kyoko remarked. "Tch. So why ain't ya' been wearin' it around?"

It was an earnest, though piercing enough question that Sayaka didn't really have a good answer for. "Well cuz, I-" She started and stopped. "I'd been saving it. Cuz I. Kinda. Sorta. Wanted… To wear it… On my own first date. Some day." A simple, innocent enough truth that somehow felt like confessing to a hundred sins. As her jealousy and bitterness over seeing Kyoko as the object of so much recent affection made her gut wretch.

"Oh." Kyoko seemed to understand the text of Sayaka's words, if not the subtext. "Well," She performed a reciprocal lunge towards Sayaka. "Just put it on then!"

"Hey!" Sayaka put up a token resistance, but Kyoko's effort would not be thwarted.

"There!" Kyoko grinned as she forcibly turned Sayaka's body towards her full body mirror. "Feelin' better 'bout everything now?" She pat Sayaka on her shoulders. "At least, a little less sucky and sulky?"

"Sulky?" Sayaka glared into the mirror at Kyoko. The German man was rather short, which was the key factor in her father's decision to regift it to her, yet still the coat was long enough to hang down to her thighs halfway to her knees. "Me?" Made of leather, black and featuring three buttons on each side for a total of six, her Dad claimed it was an old military style coat.

"Don't think I don't get why this double date's made ya' so moody!" Kyoko spoke. "Ya' thought it'd be you takin' yer best friend out on her first big date, not me! Thought you'd be the one with yer Violin Boy, not her!" So she did grasp some of the subtext. "Thought you were the coolest girl in school before I came 'round this neck of the woods and made you look like a total dork by comparison!" Just some of it, though.

"In my defense," Sayaka added. "Some of my reputation I wrecked all on my own."

"My point is that if yer not happy, it's not gonna do ya' any good just mopin' about it!" Kyoko advised. "When life bucks ya' hard ya' gotta roll with the bullshit and build your life back better than before!" Kyoko's uncharacteristic, optimistic clichés aside, Sayaka did like how the coat looked on her.

"You know, it's not that late yet," Sayaka suggested. "We still have time to head over to the mall and you can pick out your own clothes for the date." She turned to one side and pulled the collar partially over her face and nose. "And if you're worried about spending too much cash, I can lend you whatever you need." She snuck in a few clandestine whiffs of the leather.

"Ya' wanna lend me cash?" Kyoko questioned. "What if I told you my birthday's comin' up soon?"

"Nice try," Sayaka shot her a skeptical glance. "Is it really?"

"N- No…" Kyoko admitted. "What if I help you clean up this room? And you just pay me for it?" So money really was the reason her first impulse was to raid her friend's wardrobe.

"You want me to pay you to help me clean up after a mess that you made?" She couldn't help but snicker at the audacity of Kyoko's idea.

"Fine, fine! I'll take out a loan!" Kyoko picked up a bunch of Sayaka's clothes that were still on hangers and in a haste put them back on the rack. "Can we just finish the cleanup quick and get our butts goin'?" Sayaka had had the contents of her closet organized in a particular way, a detail to which Kyoko had paid no mind.

"Not so fast," Sayaka warned. "If you just stuff everything back in there willy-nilly, then don't be surprised if you get frustrated at the end when you find out the last few things you hang won't hang in there right." She snuck in one last whiff of her leather coat. The smell was older and more distinct from the plastic mask, but in its own way was just as invigorating to her senses.

"Why ya' doin' that?" Kyoko finally took notice of Sayaka's little indulgence.

"Mmmm… No reason." Sayaka fixed the collar, pulled up her cuffs and buttoned up the middle button to the left side. "Now let's get to it!"

---

"We could join the Book Club." Saya and Hitomi were examining the list of active clubs at the Satomi Academy. It was at the suggestion of one of the teachers that they consummate their reunification through an extracurricular activity. "I have met the president of that club before," Saya elaborated. "She is still in elementary school, but she is very mature for her age and she is very sweet and polite."

"The suggestion isn't bad, but," Hitomi hesitated. "I've already read 'Rashomon' twice, 'Pillow Book,' 'The Diving Pool,' 'Kokoro,' 'Strange Weather In Tokyo,' and dozens of classics from the western world." She paused, and smiled. "Reading is what I do when I want to be left alone. Not when I'm trying to make time for my friends."

"Okay," Saya next went to the one listed above it. "Perhaps Astronomy Club?"

"At my old school that club was where all the nerdiest of the male students got together to gush about UFOs and space aliens and all the silly sci-fi stuff."

"But they have access to the Murakami Array," Saya countered. "Perhaps this club will practice real astronomy instead of idle fantasy?"

"Even so I still have this feeling we'd be the only females in that club," Hitomi rejected. "I'd rather we not have to deal with constant confession letters and silly romantic advancements."

"Very well," Saya moved on. "How about Calligraphy?"

"Pass."

"Drama?"

"I'm not a good actor at all."

"Disciplinary Club?"

"I'd much prefer to lead by setting good examples, Not be an over-polished uniformed enforcer."

"Flower Arrangement?"

"I have allergies."

"What about one of the sports clubs?"

"I'd prefer something not so physically strenuous," Hitomi shook her head. "Especially since I'm still enrolled in my private Japanese Dance lessons.

"I see," If Saya was getting frustrated from all her suggestions being shot down, her face displayed no signs of showing it. "Well look what it says down here," She put her finger on the fine print near the bottom. "It says that submissions for new clubs are open. What if you and I start our own?"

"It also states that the required minimum number of club members is three," Hitomi pointed out. "We'd have to find another member, and we would have to do it before the filing deadline." She searched the rest of the pamphlet for the date. "Shoot! We have less than a week to think of a club concept and recruit another member."

Saya thought to herself for a few minutes as they walked together in the hallway. "Do you remember telling me that you wanted to seek out a career where you could help other people?"

"Yes."

"I think we should start an extracurricular club that does precisely that?"

"What do you mean?" Hitomi detected an air of enthusiasm behind Saya's suggestion, and she wanted in on it.

"I mean, there are always teachers looking for students to help them grade papers and shop for school supplies, other clubs always in need of extra hands when they plan and carry out major school events, and always elementary kids who need upperclassmen for tutoring and to plan their fun activities."

"Well," Hitomi gave her friend's suggestion some considerable thought. "The Student Council did complain about being short handed and in need of a few volunteers at the last Student Body meeting." The more she thought about it, the more she dug the notion. "It would be a pretty easy sell if we told them it was a club that expressly exists to aid other clubs in need. They may even allot us a larger budget if we can demonstrate how useful and multifaceted our skills can be."

"The thought just came to me of what we might want to call it," Saya snapped her finger. "How do you like the name 'Heroes Club'?"

"I like it!" Hitomi nodded. "With a name like that, I'm sure our idea could appeal to both the council and potential new faces."

"Alright! Now leave the task of finding a third member up to me," Saya insisted. "I think I may know of a few potential recruits." The bell for the next period rang, for the rest of the day they would have to part ways.

"Alright then," Hitomi waved as she turned the corner to her next class. "Catch you back at the arcade after school?"

"For a return to 'Sana's Kingdom'?"

"You bet!" Hitomi yelled back. "If only we could make Sana a club member, too." She joked. "Too bad she's just a jumble of lines of computer code."

"Yes," Saya muttered and waved back. "Only computer code. Too bad."

---

"Really? This is the place?" Junko stared at the billboard sign with an intense incredulity and shook her head at the 'Grand Opening' banner in the window. "'Chinese Restaurant Banbanzai'?" It was triggering post traumatic flashbacks to her very first job as a teen waitress and subsequent stint as her first employer's shift manager during the late nineteen nineties. It was an otaku-themed restaurant and the patrons couldn't keep their hands to themselves. She rechecked the address written on her recommendation letter. "Crap!" It was a match. This had to be the spot. Her company's public sector contractor was some new novelty restaurant downtown?

Her first instinct was telling her to turn back now and go home. Her second instinct was telling her that she'd been set up and fallen victim to one of those shady Japanese business practices of forcing misbehaving employees into doing non-productive busywork like staring at walls or counting paper clips until they crack enough to quit. Her third instinct was telling her that something even shadier was at work here. Her fourth instinct was telling her to keep her chin up, carry on and head inside. It was too early to draw any concrete conclusions about whatever this situation was.

"Hiiiiiiiiiiii!" A tall, brown-haired girl with a long ponytail and a big, white apron with a red pig on the front, greeted her front-and-center at the door. "Welcome to Banbanzai! Where we bring all the mightiest together to make the mmmightiest of tasty Chinese meals!" Junko was no theater critic, but it was obvious that this young lady was trying to emulate the performance of somebody else, and doing a pretty one-note and half-assed job of it.

"Uhhhhhmmm," Junko had a look around the joint. For a Grand Opening, it was pretty quiet. "I'm here concerning a potential job offer." She pulled a note from her pocket, unfolded it and held it out with both hands.

"One moment, please." The girl dropped character then snatched the letter away and inspected it underneath what looked to Junko like some sort of special blue-tinted light. "Seems legit," She guided Junko down a hallway and pointed her towards a flight of stairs. "Here's a guest key card, for security reasons you'll have to leave your phone and belongings with me." She handed her a red credit card-like key. "Second door on the left. Sit at the far end of the table. Someone will be in to give you a debrief shortly."

"Alright," Junko took the card and hesitated for a moment. What kind of restaurant keeps electronically locked doors upstairs? That feeling she got when she was first assigned to the anime committee had returned, that apprehension and the sense that she was in way above her head.

"Relax," The waitress advised as Junko handed over her purse. "It's not an interview. More of an orientation."

That somehow didn't make Junko feel any more confident. It meant that she hadn't been handpicked for this organization, so much as headhunted and drafted. She had to be ready for anything. Up to and including facing down some menacing-looking men in dark sunglasses and tattoos.

Junko slid the key into the lock and turned the handle. After a few seconds of buzzing, the door handle clicked and gave way. She took a step and came into a room with some rather spartan furnishings. There were two sets of fluorescent lights on the paneled ceiling above, false wood paneling for walls, with an oversized map of Japan on one side of the room and a rather peculiar black and white photograph of a dark-haired, mustachioed man in a military uniform framed on the other. In one far corner there was mounted a single security camera. In another, sat a potted fern.

Junko took her seat at the table and waited. And waited. And waited. And waited.

"Missus Kaname," A man's head finally poked in through the door. "Sorry to keep you waiting." She didn't have her phone, nor was there any wall clock, so she had no idea if she had been waiting at that table for five minutes or twenty-five minutes. "Few more minutes. Is there anything I can bring you in here?"

"Coffee," Junko ordered. "Gimme the strongest stuff you've got."

"Sure thing." The door closed and she waited some more. And waited. And waited. She was going to need to make a habit of wearing her watch again, that much was for certain.

"Good afternoon, Missus Kaname." A woman holding a suitcase came in and greeted her. She arrived at about a quarter after eleven, indicating that she had been waiting around for at least forty-five minutes. In her hands were two closed Styrofoam containers of liquid. "Here's that coffee." She set the suitcase down beside the table.

"About time," Junko took the coffee and promptly took a sip. "Mind if you rolled up your sleeves for me?"

"Whatever for?" The woman also had a stack of folders tucked underneath her right arm.

"Well, judging by your overwrought dress sense, by that picture on the wall, and by the premium you all place on secrecy, I would guess that you guys are some sort of government enterprise. Even so, I'd still feel better if I knew for sure that those sleeves weren't covering any gang-styled tattoos."

"You want me to prove I'm not in the Yakuza?" The woman chortled. "Well now, that is a first." She set her stack of papers down on the table and obliged. "There now. See? Not in the Yakuza." Then she added, "These days that's becoming somewhat of an outmoded stereotype, you know. Leave it to the kids to turn permanently dying the pigments of your skin into an art form and the new normal."

"Uh-huh, I understand that." Junko nodded. "No offense, it's just that I've overheard my employer's number crunchers in accounting squawk around the water cooler a number of times about a bunch of undisclosed annual expenditures, and while cooling my heels here I couldn't help but wonder just where some of that money might have gone."

"Well I certainly cannot speak towards all of who and whatever else your corporate overlords might be palling around with in the shadows," She unbound a brown twine tie around the first folder. "All I can say is that, yes, your company and our organization are engaged in a mutually beneficial relationship." Inside was a stack of papers with blank spaces that awaited Junko's signature. "They provide us a major source of operational funding, and in return we grant them first dibs on some reverse engineered procurements from out-of-town, in addition to encouraging the bureaucrats over at the National Tax Agency to look the other way from time to time whenever their bigwigs try and skirt paying their public dues."

"You've got the power to do that, huh?" Junko studied the logo at the top of the first page of the form. "United Nations Specialized Tactics and Emergency Planning." A silly-sounding name seemingly concocted around an even sillier-sounding acronym. "Seriously?" There was another logo etched at the bottom. "A division of the Unified Intelligence Taskforce." Junko had a pen in her hand but was still reluctant to sign. "So I assume this is not affiliated with the JSDF, then?"

"The military is still bound by the restrictions enshrined in our Constitution," The woman explained. "We being foremost a civilian-led scientific organization, who work in conjunction with other global security apparati, it affords us a bit more leeway pertaining to matters of humanity's peace and security on this Earth."

"Civilian and scientific, you say?" That was at least reassuring enough to get Junko to sign the first couple blank spaces. "Well I sure hope I wasn't hired for my scientific expertise, because I hate to tell you, my grades in those classes back in the day were pretty pedestrian." They say self-deprecating jokes are inadvisable to do during job interviews, but since whatever position she was filling was all but secure, she figured one may help in breaking the ice.

"No," The woman responded. Junko's joke wasn't funny, but it did get them both to loosen their postures just a hair. "If you'd sign that next line, then I can officially tell you." Junko did as she was requested. "Your official role is to serve as the day-to-day operations manager of our particular division, with your public persona being that of the manager of our humble little eating establishment."

"So I would be the girl who hires and trains, coordinates schedules, serves as a go-between for customers and staff and looks over the menu items and signs off on equipment maintenance. That the general gist?" She was offered a promotion to a similar role at her first gig, but turned it down the moment a better employer offering a higher salary came her way.

"Yes, the sorts of things a good people-person such as yourself does, except," The woman took the first folder away and presented Junko a second one. "Your staffing positions have already been filled with former security and special ops officers. Their jobs as waitresses, cooks and custodians are just cover stories for their real roles here."

"As is mine, I assume?" Though it might have been a bit presumptuous of her to believe that, since she herself was not a military member.

"Yes, but unlike them the majority of your time is still going to revolve around your people-person skills." The woman gave her an assertive wink and a nod.

"To be honest I'd have a lot more enthusiasm for this role if it weren't for those so-called people-person skills of mine that landed me in hot water at my last big scenery change." Junko signed the next set of lines reserved for her signature in the folder.

"According to our insider, you spoke your mind in a room full of yes-men and egotists and held your opinions firm in a raging river of testosterone," The woman complimented. "Speaking as another woman who's been in that kind of situation more times than I care to count, I know how tough that can be."

"So what is my role supposed to be here?" Junko stopped the informal dancing and hopped straight to the point.

"We're a hodgepodge organization made up of scientists, soldiers, spies, bureaucrats, politicians and businesspeople," The woman elaborated. "That's a lot of cooks in a kitchen that can get very, very hot at times." As Junko returned her second folder, the woman unbound and opened a third with yet another set of forms for her to sign. "Sure it's diverse, but it also is in dire need of a person who's clear-eyed enough to keep the scientists on task, the soldiers on their best behavior, the bureaucrats and bean counters assuaged, and the business interests and politicos off our asses."

"Oh, you make it all sound so easy and appealing," Junko smirked. "Still, I think I would feel more confident if I had the chance to speak with the person who last tried their hand juggling so many pins." She signed the next set of forms with a practiced rapidity.

"You're speaking with her right now," The woman grinned. "I'm Miss Yamano, the outgoing special interdepartmental liaison at this particular outpost. Don't worry, I'll hold your hand and answer whatever questions you have while the transition process is unfolding."

"Alright, then!" Junko stood up and offered her counterpart a handshake and a bow. "May I ask the reason why you're vacating? Resignation or…"

"A promotion with a transfer," Miss Yamano finished Junko's question with the answer. "Europe's gonna be a lot of fun I hear," She added in a tone that Junko couldn't tell whether it was sarcasm or not. "Here you go." She handed another folder full of paperwork for Junko to sign.

"Geez, more paperwork?" Junko took notice of the fact that this stack wasn't in a specially-bound or marked folder. "So what's this?"

"It's your first official act as the new operations director," Miss Yamano detailed. "You're signing off on our restaurant's final rebranding and on my transfer."

"A rebrand?" Junko thought for a moment. In a sudden jolt the recollection hit her. "This place used to be one of those trendy maid cafes, am I right?" Madoka had not long ago mentioned the idea of getting a part time job to supplement her allowance and support her blossoming relationship with Kamijo, just as the two of them were strolling past this place. The mental image of her daughter in one of those skimpy cosplays left such an indelible stain in Junko's brain that she gave Madoka's allowance a pretty hefty raise on the spot.

"Yeah, we wound up becoming a little too trendy by the end," Miss Yamano explained. "It's not the best idea to hide a classified facility behind a booming business. We wound up fielding more than a few unsolicited applications from the local young-uns, plus warding off unwanted video tours from tourists and those social media influencers on the Internet, and our bean counters were upset at having to launder away the profits every month," She sighed. "Not to mention I could tell my ladies up front weren't thrilled with having to wear those silly outfits every day to work. They're such troopers, though… Didn't complain about it even once!"

"So you thought looking like a cheap Chinese grub hub would suit everyone's interests better?"

"Eh, what can I say?" She shrugged. "At least the franchising rights came nice and cheap." She leaned in towards Junko as she put the back of her open hand against her cheek. "Protip, if you do ever wind up striking out into a family-run business one day, it might not be the best idea to leave the finer points of the negotiation process up to your teen daughter."

"I'll keep that in mind," Junko deadpanned as she signed the papers. With that done, Miss Yamano swapped them out for yet another folder full of paper. Fortunately, this looked to be the last set that required her signature. "Great," Junko had repeated her signature so many times that her hand was starting to get stiff. "What am I signing now?"

"A special clearance form that designates you a United Nations official security agent, which will in turn grant you special permission to own and carry a certain personal safety tool that is standard issue in our field." She picked up the briefcase beside that table and placed it on top.

"Oh? What would tha-" Before Junko could finish her question Miss Yamano unlocked the briefcase and opened it.

"SIG Sauer P226 series," Miss Yamano said. "You will of course be fully trained on how to use one, along with a certain selection of other military-grade hardware."

"Oh, my-gawd!" Junko had her hand pressed to her mouth. To Miss Yamano it looked like she was letting out a big, surprised gasp. But what Junko was actually doing was trying keep from barfing up her eggs.

She had never even seen a real, live firearm in her entire life before. And now she was expected to handle and train with one on the fly? Just what hell had she gotten herself into?

"Until the paperwork all goes through, I'm not authorized to explain the true nature of the specific threats our organization faces," Miss Yamano went on. "But I'll just say… If only the things we face were as easy to tackle as the Yakuza."

"Oooooooohboy."