The streets reflected orange. From the concrete, the glass and steel of buildings, as the sun slowly began to sink more and more of it was colored in. The throngs of people in the streets heading to and from work, to get food, to unwind. Some people were looking to have fun, others were looking to desperately unwind from the stresses they dealt with throughout today. For some people, it was minor problems, like simply not getting in line when they wanted or worrying about a quiz. For others, they had to deal with an overly-harsh boss or even fellow students bullying them.

A cauldron of human emotions.

In one case, a particular salaryman's resentment for his boss was threatening to boil over and explode. Pressured on work, facing long hours, it was all getting to him the more and more time he spent at his job this week. And all of that frustration was currently targeted squarely at the man in charge right now. He'd manage to calm down, and perhaps realize his situation wasn't quite as bad as it initially appeared, as the night wore on.

But those strong negative feelings wouldn't simply vanish.

They would go to join others, in dark places.

And some particularly powerful negative emotions had been building up for a little while now.
In these dark places, these negative feelings would coalesce.

Merging, twisting together, uniting into physical forms. Dangerous forms. Creatures that could cause dangerous thoughts to linger in the minds of humans by their mere presence, to amplify the negative feelings that they were already experiencing. The stronger they got, the more this influence grew. And that wasn’t all. When these creatures fully manifested, they were able to affect the world physically. To attack human beings directly.

But that was why they were here.

It wasn’t just negative feelings. Joy. Hopes. Dreams. One could call them warriors who stood for these kinds of things. The young girls who fought to protect the people of Tokyo from the shades manifesting from their darker thoughts and emotions.
Magical Girls.

And in this starlit city, many magical girls were selected to fight for its people. It was a necessity, simply due to the number of human beings living in a place like this.

And in some cases, these girls decided to work together.

As the sun sank lower and lower, one such group was already on its way to meeting.

Shinjuku had recently seen an unusual rise in the number of shades appearing at night. The shadowy, abnormal figures had been congregating in the ward and its neighbors with increasing frequency, in larger groups then they had been doing so prior. It wasn't as if there was any obvious swell in negative emotions, but something had to explain the rise in their numbers, didn't it?

It was only fitting that they’d picked the Shinjuku Gyeon National Garden as their meeting spot. The green grasses and shaded spots provided by the many trees and other flora made for a natural spot in an otherwise bustling part of the city. Even if they didn’t spend much time admiring the scenery, they’d at least be somewhere that was nice.

It was time to plan their next move.

@Ammokkx@Shiyonichi@Rune_Alchemist@King Cosmos@Raineh Daze

---

Where was everyone else?

Had she really been the first to arrive?

Amidst the gardens, the tall trees and the lakeside just on the path next to one of the bridges that crossed over the water, stood a pink haired girl in a rather flashy white, gold, and red outfit. Arms folded across her chest, foot tapping impatiently. Seriously, where the heck were they? How long was she going to have to wait? Maybe she was early? Did she get the meeting time wrong? As she'd begin to pace back and forth a bit, she'd sigh, consigning herself to waiting longer.

Ugh, this was a pain in the ass. All of this was. Where was something she could just punch already? She almost wanted a grudge to manifest so she could clobber the living hate out of it. Maybe she was just being impatient, though, but ever since he...she, became a magical girl, there was just a constant pervasive impatience that seemed to hang over her head. Even when she wasn't transformed and she managed to remain a bit more calm and out of the way, it was still there.

She'd pull her thoughts away from that as she'd pull out her phone. Didn't they have some sorta magical girl line thing or something? Maybe they were having a laugh about this.

"You guys are so slooooow where the heck are at?! I could've already beat all these bad guys up!"
"If you're not here in the next minute I'm gonna have all the fun to myself!"

Hmhm, yes that should get their attention. Probably. Maybe.

"They should really work on their heroic timing. This isn't the time to make a dramatic last second entrance..."

The second to arrive was one of the most noticeable members of their little group... even if she had put off transforming before arrival. In fact, that probably only made her more distinctive, the huge blonde foreigner standing out like a sore thumb. As for why she had come over in her civilian form? Well, from the look of it, they huge bag bursting with convenience store snacks might have something to do with it.

Abigail still wasn't sure if running around transformed counted as walking the dog, either, so that was another reason to not transform until everyone was here. Lucy, now off of her leash... slowly walked over to the pink-haired magical girl and gave her a gentle headbutt, blue eyes imploringly looking up for attention.

"Oh, has nobody else arrived?" the blonde asked, looking around to make sure nobody else was hiding behind a tree just waiting to pop out, "That means you have first choice of the snacks, then."

It really was too many snacks and drinks for less than half a dozen girls, but telling her that before made no difference. She was quite happy to keep buying them all, and it was rather hard to stop her, since it was impossible to get hold of her until school was over and she came to find them (let alone in the evening like this).

The third appeared with the roar of an engine. A blue motorcycle and rider stopped infront of the duo of magical girls, before the rider stepped off the vehicle, with a fairy floating behind her. “Evening.” the rider said taciturn as she took off the full faced helmet before hanging it off the handle bars.

“Kana, you’re just going to leave it at that? I know your shy around others, but they are your comrades now you shouldn’t be so shy.” the fairy spoke behind her as if they were a mother trying to encourage their child to make friends. “Shu-Shut up, Quant. We’re just here to kill Shades.” Kana responded in a rather Tsundere kinda way. The Delinquent Girl was actually the newest of the team. She was a Magical Girl only for a relatively short amount of time and the amount of time she spent with the on the team was even less, so there was a still a bit of awkwardness when she was with the others.

“So, I guess the rest haven’t arrived. So do we know what’s on there or are we going in blind?” Kana stated the obvious as she saw Takara looking like she wanted to shove her fist into something and Abigail bring out a stall of snacks. ”Oh I’ll take a Calpico! Thanks Abigail!” The fairy floated over to take a bottle from Abigail. Though Kana didn’t seem to take any.

Shun Nakano

Shun was running late. Well, actually she was walking, but she was definitely late. Actually, if you wanted to be technical, it was more of a leisurely amble than a walk, taking her time so that she could enjoy the ambiance of Shinjuku at night before meeting up with the others; which was probably why she was running so late if she was being honest. It would probably be a good idea to start running late at this point, so that she wouldn’t be quite as late when she finally did arrive. It would be an even better idea not to be late in the first place, but that ship had already sailed and Shun had missed the boat because she wasn’t watching the time.

Well, it was probably fine. It wasn’t like she was going to be the only one who was late.

Her phone buzzed in her pocket and she pulled it out to see a message in their super-secret magical girl group chat. From the looks of it people had already started to arrive, or one person at least; of course it was Takara, that girl was always spoiling for a fight so no wonder she was the first one there when it was time to fight shades.

And she was calling the rest of them slow. Brat.

Shun could run rings around all of them; she was slow by choice. It was called procrastination.

Time to retaliate.

[Starry-Eyed]: Wait, really?
[Starry-Eyed]: You’re gonna take out all the bad guys by yourself?
[Starry-Eyed]: Guess I’ll just go home then, since you got this covered
[Starry-Eyed]: Thanks a bunch, short stuff. I’ll be cheering you on

Takara wasn’t much shorter than Shun really, only an inch or so, but she was shorter and Shun wasn’t above using that to her advantage. That combined with making it sound like her attempt to hurry them up had the opposite effect should get under her skin enough to pay her back for the ‘slow’ comment. Hopefully she wouldn’t take it seriously and actually try to fight all the Shades herself.

…She wouldn’t right?

No, Takara wasn’t that gung-ho, and even if she was there were probably others there to keep her in check. They wouldn’t all be as late as she was, right?

She pulled out her phone again and began typing.

[Starry-Eyed]: Wait, no
[Starry-Eyed]: Don’t do that
[Starry-Eyed]: You’ll die
[Starry-Eyed]: I’ll be right there

Shun started running.

----

She tried to play it cool as she arrived at the park a few minutes later, fully transformed, to find that not only had Takara not run off by herself, but that there were two others waiting with her. Linking her hands behind her head, Shun sauntered over to them as casually as she could, pretending like she hadn’t just driven herself into a panic with an invented scenario and then raced over as fast as she could to prevent it; nope, definitely not.

“Got anything to drink in there?”

---

"I'm here!! I'm heeeere!!!"

The overly loud, slightly obnoxious scream was a precursor to a certain pink-haired feline fellow barely sticking the landing from a long-leap tree-top jump. After a couple of "W-whoa" and "Awawa"'s while flailing her arms, the girl manages to stabilize herself. She then puts her hand on her knees, looking incredibly winded.

"Haa... Haa... Magical Girl Nico, on-scene~!" she'd say with a bit of tired flourish, before immediately losing all her energy again. "Uuuh... I read that I was late from Taka-chan, but the meeting spot is so far from my school... I ran over the rooftops and then through the trees to get here and everything, and I'm still the last one here!!" Nico complained, her arms spread in a battle stance as she screamed skyward. Then Nico blinked a couple times and stopped with the theatrics, scratching the back of her head.

"Ahahehe, that's everyone right? Um... oh!" she mused, then noticed Abigail's bag of snacks. Slowly, sloooowly Nico inched forward. She was already salivating from the idea of getting any food at all after a workout. "Gaaaail-chaaaan... gimme!" Nico said and pounced in the direction of the girl now-her-size, intent on nabbing that bag for herself.

---

If impatiently waiting could be a skill, Takara would likely have won several awards for it. So when the messaging app buzzed with a reply, she'd quickly check the reply...and immediately frown in irritation. Short stuff? Fine, if she wanted to go home see how much she actually cared! Zero, that was it, definitely! Oh wait...she actually sent a follow up message. Don't die? What was she? A child?! Well, yes, but she could handle herself against some basic bad guys!

She was about to type up a very angry reply, when something warm and fuzzy headbutted her in the leg. Looking down, she'd see the dog and internally cringe, angrily stuffing her phone in her pocket and giving the mutt a pat on the head before walking over to Abigail.

"Finally." Takara huffed, noticing the bags of well, everything Abigail came walking up with. "Got anything good in there or just gonna eat it all yourself?" She'd snatch up her favorite - an unreasonably sour hard candy. The roar of an engine finally indicated that they had at least, all started to finally show up and filter in.

"Kana." She'd give at least a polite greeting, though her somewhat irritable expression didn't change as she'd pop the sour candy into her mouth without so much as batting an eye...at least until Shun finally arrived. Takara stomped over, immediately giving the other girl a somewhat rough punch on the shoulder before she could react.

"Shorty?! I'm like, the second tallest here! You're just unreasonably tall!" So she says, without having actually looked at the heights of her teammates.

Handing out drinks wasn't such a demand on her attention that Abigail could miss the very loud, very pink girl coming in... and making a jump for the bag all by herself. There were many possible ways she could have defended her bag of snacks: she could have transformed, she could have dived to the side, or spun around, or...

Instead, she did the obvious thing when someone made a wild leap like that: lift it straight up, completely beyond reach. Honestly, even if she transformed, she would still be the tallest here, if not by much, trying to do something like that when she had so much of a height advantage was silly. She had nearly a foot or more on practically every girl she met.

Of course, Nico's wild grab for the bag wasn't entirely fruitless: Lucy decided to plod over, giving her hand a friendly lick.

"Now, now, Nico, there's enough for everyone," the blonde said, handing over, after a second of thought, some melon bread.

@Raineh Daze @Ammokkx

Reading Takara's message as she strolled towards the national garden, Ukiko snickered. Yes she was late, but she had a good reason to be. Magical girls needed to train, didn't they? And what better way than by taking this opportunity to perfect a surprise appearance?

She put away her phone and hid behind a wide tree, two issues nagging at her thoughts as blue-green wisps danced around her. The first was the fact that magical girls could sense each other. She'd need to find some way around that. The second, well... As the wisps died down, revealing her ashen-skinned, frill-clad transformed self, that second issue materialised in the form of a floating paper lantern by her side.

"I know that look on your face all too well-bura," her familiar chided. Ukiko rolled her eyes. Trust Burabura to start being annoying the moment she appeared. "What are you planning on pulling this time-bura?"

A smirk spreading over her face, Ukiko crept forward until the meeting place came into view, along with the distant forms of several other magical girls. "You did say I needed to take this seriously and hone my skills," she whispered. "So this is just a little sneak attack training. Don't ya worry, I won't actually hurt anyone, just gotta wait for the right moment."

She ignored Burabura's drawn-out groan and mutter of "Excuses excuses-bura."

Crouching and peering out from the bushes, she spotted the perfect chance. A certain pink catgirl leapt at Abigail, aiming for a bag filled with what looked like snacks, and missing as the much taller girl raised it high. A distraction. "Now!" Ukiko whispered, turning invisible, Burabura reluctantly doing the same.

With Abigail's attention divided between Nico and her dog, Ukiko rose into the air and sped forward. Stretching her hands out like claws and putting on a crazed rictus of a grin, she blinked back into visibility right in front of Abigail's face. "Yaaaaaaaah!" Maybe this would even give Nico the opportunity to grab that bag - of course, given the assistance she now had, sharing of the snacks would be much appreciated.

Shun Nakano

The look of innocence Shun put on her face when she saw Takara stomping over to her probably wasn’t very convincing. She couldn’t quite keep the smirk off her lips or the sparkle out of her eyes as the shorter girl gave her a piece of her mind and a punch to the shoulder. Glad to see she was right that the comment would get under her skin, not that that was particularly difficult where Takara was concerned.

“Hey, hey, hey, I’m average height at best.” With a flourish that would draw the eye, Shun pointed off to the side, where Abigail was currently holding the bag of snacks high enough that the grasping catgirl couldn’t reach them. “She is unreasonably tall.”

Now that she wasn’t panicking as much and knew that the worst she was going to get for her words was a punch in the arm and a huffy magical girl, Shun was more than willing to push her luck. “But don’t worry, I’m sure you’ll catch-up to us soon. So…!” Stepping away from the other girl, and hopefully out of arms reach, Shun sought to quickly change the topic by engaging the rest in conversation. “What are we waiting for? Is everyone here?”

@Rune_Alchemist

She might be surprised, and she might have jumped... but the bag still remained annoyingly out of reach, largely because with her arm locked in that position, it wasn't likely to come down unless she outright dropped it. Which would have simply bonked Ukiko on the head with a half-full bag of snacks, so maybe it was for the better that she hadn't dropped it on the ghostly girl.

"There's been a nasty Shade seen around the park," the blonde answered, finally lowering her arm to start manually disseminating the remainder of her goodies. Really, trying to take the entire bag... you'd just shake up all the drinks and crush the rest of the snacks with bottles, "It's been rather difficult to track down, so we'll need to do it as a group."

Since it had resisted being found by one person, Abigail suspected it was smart enough to run away. Finding a Shade was usually the easiest part of the job; although transforming your dog made it an even easier task, they were generally bad at the level of subtlety to avoid being picked up.

@Raineh Daze

Ukiko may not have gotten Nico access to the bag of snacks, but her jumpscare plan at least had been successful. Chortling, she drifted to the ground. "Told you I'd manage to sneak up on you some day!"

By her side, Burabura rolled her one eye. "A simple hi would've gone down better-bura."

"Like I said." Ukiko's Cheshire cat grin grew. "Gotta get some training in. And why not have fun in the process?" The other reason, the one she didn't voice, was that being around so many people still set her nerves on edge. That feeling of not knowing what to say or do was hard to shake, but putting up a brash goofy act helped offset it. She wasn't that timid little Hotaru Ukiko any more. She was Ghostlight.

Accepting a mochi from Abigail, she munched on it as she listened to the mission briefing. Her eyebrows furrowed. A shade successfully evading a magical girl? That wasn't a usual occurrence. "Heh. So it knows it's not the scariest thing in this park," she said, her gaze flicking around at the others. "It can run, but it can't hide! Burabura and I can keep a lookout from above. If we both stay invisible for as long as we can, and dip into the trees in between, we should be able to make sure nobody notices us... as cool as it'd be to start an urban legend, it wouldn't be so great to let scaredy-shade feast on people's freakouts."

---

Takara's glare only intensified as shun teased her further. This...this....

"Grrrr..." She growled, though it was a much less menacing growl then she intended as she waved her arms more like an angry puppy than anything else. "I don't need to catch up to anyone! I'm perfectly average height!" Or was, at least! Ugh, this was soooo frustrating! Why the hell couldn't she have at least kept her height!? Shun might have been right about Abigail being taller, but that went in one ear and out the other.

At least the talk of the shade managed to pull her attention from beating Shun to a pulp.

"Hmph, its a coward then." She'd reply to Abigail, turning to face the other magical girl, though still glaring at Shun. Still, this was probably not something she was immediately good at. Tracking something was not her specialty at all, even if a proper hero had special tracking abilities and devices. "It probably just saw me and run like a chicken. Once I find it I'll rip its arms off. If one of you guys can make yourself useful and track it, I can do the rest."