[IC] The Truth Behind the Project

[Flamelord]

The message, when Miyako received it, was annoying for her at least. She was fine with telling them where the meeting would be held, but simply telling them to show up whenever they were able, and yet 'as soon as possible' was more than a bit aggravating. That would be an immense waste of time, so wouldn't it simply be better to name a time and then tell them to be there?

Well, sadly she didn't have any say in the matter, so she simply sighed to herself. Honestly, for being veterans you'd think they would have more common sense. "I'll be there when I can," she answered succinctly, not wasting more energy on that than she had to. At the very least she would be there eventually, once school was out.

That done, she looked back to the board and the teacher, scribbling away notes as she tried to catch up to where Miso City was in terms of curriculum. That was the pain of moving, since her old school and this school had been in different areas of teaching, which she now had to compensate for. But she'd handle it one way or another, even with magical girl duties to add to that little dilemma. She'd done it before, after all.

For now, she simply focused. There would be time to worry about all that stuff later. This was the time specifically for classes, and she wasn't going to waste it.

[KoL]

"Perhaps we should talk once Rose is with us. During the lunch break?" Yuna said as a flow of students started to come in their direction. At the same time she started to get a little flushed as she listened to some of their small talk.

"Oh, look, who's that girl talking to Natsume-sempai?"

"She's so pretty, I wanted to have a hair like that..."

Yuna couldn't help but feel that she had a little more gazes turned in her direction that she was comfortable with. "That's why I don't like schools," she said as she pushed her skirt a little lower. Why was it that Chiyo had to get her such a short skirt, anyway?

Meanwhile, outside of the school...

"Greetings, Elise Augermann and Izumi Kaede." A Contractor said as it came walking down the back alley, "It seems that circumstances have changed and now your meeting have been rearranged to the lunch break at this school, if you have anything else to do, you can come here later. However..." it jumped above a couple of school bags that were laying in the alley, "Wouldn't be easier if you could just sneak in without using your magic?"

As the Contractor waited for their answer it kept staring at them while swinging its tail to and fro, unnervingly.

---

@Spriggs27@Ariamis@TheWindel

[MarsAdept]

Rose stopped just around the corner from the school. She let the Contractor down out of her arms and transformed into ordinary attire. The contractor informed her of the meeting changing. Rose just kept walking. She took note but said nothing. Her eyes barely lifted from the ground to see where she was going. Emiri's murder was a deep blow to Rose. Even as she sat through her morning classes, she could not focus on the lesson. She was even more quiet than she usually was. Only one of her teachers pulled her aside after class to ask how she was doing. She did not want to discuss it with the teacher, so the teacher just left the annoying invitation 'I will be here when you are ready to talk'. Rose never liked people like that. The teacher did help Rose with one aspect. Rose's grieving turned from sorrow, to anger. Still, she said nothing to no one.

Finally suffering through her morning classes, Rose made her way to the meeting place during lunch. She was the first one there besides the Contractor. The Contractor gave a greeting and Rose just barked at him to be silent. Rose looked at the box lunch she had to eat for lunch. She tried but could not eat it. She did not have the stomach for it.

[TheWendil]

“Studying as always.”

The Contractor said this aloud as it watched Miyako in the classroom from its perched spot. Out of all the wishes it had granted, hers had to be one of the most interesting in recent times. A Magical Girl that strived to be the very best was one that was rife with all sorts of opportunities and possibilities.

“Apologies if I’m interrupting your concentration Miykao Komatsu, but why not use your magic to excel in your scholarly pursuits? What good is a wish to be perfect if you don’t take advantage of it?”

Back at Miso High, Akame noted the Contractor’s sudden vocalization with a neutral expression. She didn’t know it, but this was preaching much the same thing as its counterpart near Miyako. Crossing her arms, she looked up when the bell began to ring.

“Apologies Contractor, but some humans would rather obtain their goals without external influence.”

“Is that so? You humans are all the same then. Confusing and redundant. I just don’t understand,” the Contractor mused before bounding off into the unknown. With that said, it was time for classes to begin. The first half of the day went relatively smoothly without incident and soon enough the lunch bell ringed. It was the signal for all the Magical Girls to gather and Akame hoped Nanako and the others had remembered her message.

When Akame entered the meeting place, she immediately noticed Rose’s sullen expression. Her concern only grew all the more as she noticed that Emiri was still not among them. Quickening her pace, she sat beside the water Magical Girl before asking, “What’s wrong?”

Her question would not be answered as the shrill scream of a girl filled the air. One of the students had collapsed right in the middle of the lunch area, a large puncture wound shown on their side, fresh blood seeping out. Akame sensed then the presence of a Primordial and tensed.

Why here and now? And how had it gotten past her detection? Either these things were getting smarter on where they struck or they were evolving. Or maybe the Magical Girls were losing their edge. Whatever the case, they couldn’t reveal themselves in public as the other students began to be worked up into a blind panic.

Akame saw a glimpse of their enemy in the resulting chaos, the flash of a rapier catching her attention.

[MarsAdept]

Rose set her lunch just stared at her uneaten lunch. She thought of what she could saw to Akame about Emiri. As she tried to speak she was almost brought to tears. She set her lunch down beside her and leaned forward. She rested her elbow on her knees and twiddled her thumbs. She had prepared for this why now was she hesitating. Rose was always tried to be the distant one. She hid in her secrets. Why did Emiri affect her so badly like this? Rose hated dying. The concept she never liked. That is why she made the wish that she did.

Sensing a Primordial focused Rose sharply. She stood up. A fight would do her good, or at least she hoped. "It is days like this I wish it would rain. I will explain after we handle this. I might need your focus." Rose said with her voice shaking.

[Ariamis]

Huh. I I guess I was really drunk then, Elise thought when she finally had the mystery solved. Maybe I'll let off on the grape rockets until I can hold them a bit better. Elise didn't care about being called a jerk or not having a 'figure', but Izumi's hasty attitude did start to get irritating. It was like a screaming child constantly tugging on their parents clothes to demand what they want. And even after she got them to where they needed to go in record time, Izumi kept going with her tantrum. It's true that Rose's clothes were a bit tight on Elise, especially around areas that would draw male attention, but calling her weak was the last straw.

"Hey, I got us here like Razor wanted us to, and even though I don't expect a word of thanks from a brat like you you could at least shut the hell up for one second! Besides, I'm not going to wear this ugly rag any longer than I have to, so don't you call me weak again or I'll make you eat those words, you damn dwarf!" Elise was shaking her fist at Izumi when the Contractor appeared. It started talking nonsense about the meeting being changed and Elise, already in a bad mood, was not receptive:

"And you can go to hell with your suggestions, furball. Unless I get word from Razor or Arcane myself I ain't budging."
It turned out Elise was going to budge, as she then heard a girl scream, and sensed a Primordial. "Oh, here we go. This time I'm not gonna lose!" Taking the classic approach, Elise rushed inside the school, transformed into her magical form and carrying her two swords on each hand, searching for the Primordial.

[Pudding]

"Akame-san! I'm on my way! I noticed a strange presence just now, so I'm running as fast as I can!" It was rather eerie, only moments ago Nanako was going at leisurely pace, but now, a sense of emergency rushed through her body, screaming at her to hightail it to the school. So she did just that.
Nanako quickly ran into Izumi, just before she saw Elise run into the school and quickly transform into her battle outfit. She could only assume the worst from this situation.

"Izumi-chan! It-it's not ... One of them is it?" Asked the frail girl. She wasn't looking forward to the fight, on account of her lack of training and how to actually use her abilities properly. "Are you going to go and fight? I don't thin I could do it, perhaps we should leave it to the senpai this time..." Looking down at her feet, she began to doubt herself, why bother agreeing to join the team, if she wasn't going to fight. Some magical girl she was.

[KoL]

Just as Rose stood from her place and began walking in the direction of the Primordial, she and Akame felt the temperature drop several degrees, to the point where their breath started to come out of their mouths as white puffs of vapour. When they looked behind them, there came Yuna already transformed in her magical girl form.

As she passed by them, Yuna touched Rose's petite shoulder and said,"Your eyes aren't normal today, Rose. I don't know what you've seen, but seeking death at the hands of a Primordial won't do you any good. Leave this to me, it's been a long time since I last fought, so my soulgem is at its strongest state now." Not daring to turn and look at Rose again, Yuna said, "Take care of her, Akame," before vanishing in a blur of speed.

"Despite all that big talk I'm just a hypocrite, after all." Yuna thought, as she clutched a bloody rosary with her right hand. Yuna barely had the time to finish her self-deprecating thought, as before she could even notice, she was already being charged upon by the Rapier.

Quickly Yuna summoned her spear and with a swift blow she parried the Primordial's weapon. Using the creature's reaction to her advantage, Yuna completed a full swing of her spear and hit the Primordial's exposed flank with the satisfying sound of bones crushing under the weight of her weapon's shaft. "This isn't over yet!" She shouted, while piercing the ground with her spear, summoning a patch of steel hard icicles to impale the Primordial as it hit the wall behind it.

"Rrrrr!" The Primordial roared as it got back to its feet before returning Yuna's courtesy by creating a field of wicked blades of its own by impaling the ground with her weapon.

"Too slow!" Yuna shouted as she appeared behind the Rapier and hammered her collarbone with an axe kick, breaking yet another of the monster's bones, before spinning her body and sending the Primordial flying again with a reverse roundhouse, this time the primordial hit a column, sending cracks all the way up the wall.

However, just as Yuna was readying herself to finish the Primordial, she noticed a few unknown magical signatures moving in her direction,"More of them? No... magical girls?" Yuna said as she turned to look at them, after freezing the Primordial in place. Behind her there were Elise, Nanako and Izumi, all of the girls she had never met in her life before, so it her next questions, "Who are you? And, why is there so many magical girls in the city at the same time?" were quite natural.

---

A little away from there, at Miyako's school...

The Contractor ignored any of the other humans around and at the same gauging their reactions to see if anyone had the potential to notice him, as he snuggled his fluffy face on Miyako's cheek, before saying,"Aren't you going to join your allies, Miyako Komatsu? Sure you must have felt the appearance of the Primordial and judging by our assumptions this probably means that more of them are bound to appear somewhere, maybe even on this school."

The Contractor waited to gauge Miyako's reaction before continuing, "Though I understand you, leaving now would mean that you'll be missing your afternoon classes. It's pretty reasonable of you to think you can leave everything to the others, to say the truth. What's the possibility of what happened yesterday getting repeated, anyway?"

[Flamelord]

Miyako glanced over surreptitiously as the Contractor spoke, somehow unsurprised to find him at her school. She had assumed that it might take him a bit longer given that she had just moved and transferred schools, but that was obviously not the case. Well, she could live with it, so long as he didn't make too much of a nuisance of himself. It was how she'd worked with him before, in her old town.

"Who says I'm not," she whispered over to him, in a way that would allow her to talk without people noticing that something was odd. She really didn't need to be seen as the girl who talked to herself, if she could help it. But magical girl powers were useful like that, as she had learned over time.

She jotted down a note as she glanced over at the creature, finishing that before speaking up once more. "Anyway, it's easier for me to be a magical girl if I'm near the middle of the pack, rather than sticking out. This way no one notices me and I can devote more time to killing Primordials and saving people." She shrugged then in addition. "Besides, I just moved here. I'm still getting adjusted." As far as she was concerned it was the truth, due to how curriculums varied between schools and regions. Once she got used to it then she could make her deception that much better.

She turned her attention back to working then, jotting down notes and answering the occasional question that she felt confident in doing. It was how she had done things in her previous school, and it seemed that it would serve her well here. She didn't need the bother of having to exert herself at school when she already did the same as a magical girl in her fights.

Then the ripple, and she felt it as her gaze turned in that direction, towards the Primordial that had appeared. Well, that was unfortunate. But still, she wasn't overly worried about it. It wasn't as if there was an overabundance of magical girls in this city. They could handle it as far as she was concerned, and she couldn't really afford to ditch on the first day she was here.

She grunted, shifting slightly away from the Contractor as he rubbed against her cheek. "Nah," she replied, managing to repress a shake of her head. "Calling out the whole gang for a single Primordial is overkill, and even if there's more than one, there are enough veterans to handle it." Of course, she didn't know exactly where it was, but as far as she was concerned, it wasn't her problem until someone who wasn't currently in school called for her help.

So for now, she wrote, and worked her school day away.

[Spriggs27]

Izumi almost butted heads with the magical girl the towered over her, she just lost it when Elise called her a dwarf." Well screw you...You." The girl struggled to come up with something to call Elise." You stupid, weak, knuckle dragging, fat, tall barbarian !" Izumi yelled at Elise as she tried to run off to fight the primordial with the others leaving Izumi alone behind the school. As Izumi was trying to go into the school she came across the other magical girl that met her eye level, Nanako, the other magical girl looked shooken up and scared, but it seemed normal for a girl her age to be that way in a dangerous situation

Izumi out a hand on Nanako's shoulder." It is one of them, I can feel them, but we have to be careful, we're both not fully trained yet and we could both get hurt and I understand you may be feeling scared right now, but over time you have to toughen up." Izumi playfully hit Nanako in the arm softly." But don't worry I believe in everyone, even that Elise girl." Izumi said Elise's name with disdain and almost spat onto the ground almost getting a migrane from her. Suddenly the primordial came to them, feeling heroic, Izumi jumped in front of Nanako to protect the girl.

And before Izumi could transform and get her weapon, another magical girl showed up, but she was one Izumi never seen before, the girl froze the primordial and looked to the two, Izumi felt a little beaten when the girl jumped in and saved them, she felt like she had a moment to show her skills taken from her and she probably wouldn't get another moment to help save the day.

@Ariamis@Pudding@KoL

[MarsAdept]

Rose felt the sudden cold and cursed under her breath. She wanted rain not snow. Snow was too peaceful. Rose flinched when a hand touched her shoulder. Yuna?! Of course it was her. Rose suddenly remembered that she had called ahead that she was going to return. Rose was not all that happy to see her. She made all Rose's water into Ice. Rose could still use Ice but not as easy. Yuna's words did not consul Rose one bit. Rose was never going to die. Ever. She might not be mortal but her wish made her death hard. She would make her killer suffer for the right to end her. As Yuna sprinted away, Rose transformed. She pulled out her Urumi with some force. Its three whiplike blades sparked as they scrapped along the concrete. "I am not something that needs protecting. I refuse to let a primordial kill me. I don't seek death." Rose said aloud knowing that Yuna was too far away to hear. "Fine, Take the Kill, ice queen. Akame... Akame... well hrmm... I cannot find the words to soften the truth... Emiri is dead." Rose said chocking on her words, a tear escaped her eyes.

@TheWindel

[Ariamis]

There was grumbling and teeth-gnashing on Elise's part when she left to hunt the Primordial: Izumi was really getting on her nerves, and she was really yearning for something to rip apart and slaughter so she could relieve a bit of her growing frustration. If she couldn't find anything, well, she had to settle with beating Izumi up. She found the Primordial, but was too late: another magical girl had it frozen up with seemingly ice-based powers. Elise responded to her questions:
"That's none of your damn business! Now out of my way!" Elise was not going to let herself be denied of her kill, so she ran past the ice girl and sliced the frozen Primordial apart in a fury of slashes, ending with a smash from her greatsword leaving the being as a wet stain on the floor. She turned around to look at her with disdain.
"Are you stupid or something, leaving a Primordial alive like that? Damn you really poop the party with this cold, brrr."

[KoL]

*OOC: I'm posting this from my phone, that's why it lacks formatting.

"That was... unnecessary," Yuna said when Elise reduced the pinned Primordial to a bloody pulp. It wasn't so much the fact that the redhead stole her kill that was unsettling Yuna, but the overtly and graceless user of violence.

However, when Elise growled at her like a wild animal, Yuna thought that she had figured what was happening, "I know it, you're having one of those days, aren't you, Bloodhair? I know how you feel, the first periods are always the worst." Yuna said while turning to face the other girls.

"I'm Yuna Yukino, I get it that all of you are acquaintances of Akame and the others, right? If so would you care to follow me and hear the report of my travels?" Yuna said as she turned back to her school uniform, since the courtyard was empty by now, and walked away to where Akame and Rose waited for her.

[Spriggs27]

Izumi held her bare arms as a cold breeze pasted everyone and almost had her teeth chattering, she noticed that before the monster was frozen and Elise stole the new magical girl's win, like stubborn battle loving person she was, Izumi noticed that the monster was soaked in water before the new magical girl appeared and froze it." When it comes down to Elise, unnecessary is above her vocabulary, all she knows is kill, beat, and destroy." Izumi told the new magical girl." That's right we're apart of Akame's group." Izumi confirmed and began to follow Yuna pulling Nanako along holding the child's hand.

[KoL]

It was almost lunch time at Miyako's school and the Contractor that was with her still hadn't gone away, instead it was curled in a corner of her desk fiddling with her eraser while commenting on her science teacher's lesson.

"We don't understand how you humans can be fooled by such simple questions. Your so-called Newtonian Physics is nothing but a deception that you keep on getting attached with. Of course, there's some of you who are closer to finding the right answer than others, but still there's a long way before you get to the same level of understanding that we posses."

The Contractor didn't cared if his incessant ramblings about how human science was so far off the truth that it was almost comical, were boring Miyako or not. After all it was stating the truth and so it was pointless to try and refute him.

-----

Just as the lunch bell rang, a girl came to the desk next to Miyako's holding her lunchbox in one hand and a copy of the class roster on the other. She bowed politely before saying, "I'm Hitomi Sora, the class representative. I'm glad to meet you Komatsu-san."

Then she offered the class roster/student handbook to Miyako, "You don't have a copy of them yet, do you? Please take these. Ahh..." she paused for a bit and her cheeks got slightly flushed as she continued, "Did you bring your lunch? I'm asking this because we, the girls I mean, generally don't go eat at the cafeteria, so... I was thinking if you would allow me to sit here?"

Before Miyako could answer Sora's question, the bashful girl made one last remark, "Also, maybe the teacher was overlooking it because it's your first day here, but bringing toys to the classroom is strictly prohibited." Sora said while pointing to the Contractor, sitting atop Miyako's desk.

---

@Flamelord

[TheWendil]

“Goodness, so much is happening,” Chiyo commented idly. The girl and the Contractor were resting on the school roof top for lunch break when suddenly a Primordial was sensed. It seemed to be zipping about with speeds far outclassing anything they had seen, its weapon of choice a rapier.

Before she could do anything though, the newcomer from earlier this morning had quickly dispatched it with little effort along with Elise dealing the finishing blow. Well that was anti-climatic to say the least but it certainly got the job done. Peering over the edge, she saw Yuna escorting the new ones from yesterday away and presumably to Akame’s group.

“Will you be joining them?”

“Maybe. Not gonna lie, it’s kind of fun messing with Nanako. It’s so cute to see her try her best when she has no clue what’s doing.”

Chiyo chuckled to herself while the Contractor only shook its head and went back to lying out in the sun lazily. That is, if it could even emit the expression of laziness.

“If you say so. I’ll never understand you humans.”

Back down below, Akame was trying to figure out all the events rapidly occurring around her. First and foremost she felt the Primordial’s presence disappear, as if it shattered into nothingness. Then Rose dropped the biggest news of all with the revelation of Emiri’s death. Akame paled as she processed just what her comrade was saying before moving closer to her.

Rose was already letting grief take control and while Akame understood, they had to stay level-headed for the time being. She placed a steady hand on the other girl’s shoulder, words escaping her for the moment before she finally got her thoughts together.

“We’ll avenge her,” she said calmly though her hand began to quiver. “We’ll find out who or what killed her. But for now we have to tend to the others. We did schedule a meeting after all. If you’re not comfortable with it, I can tell them of Emiri’s fate.”

The flaming Magical Girl let out a shuddering sigh before gently leading the still transformed girl away and towards the others. It was all she could do right now for the both of them.

[Ariamis]

"Huh? What did you-" Elise spurted out, but that was all she said before she turned silent all of a sudden. She wanted to shout and curse at the girl for bringing something embarrassing like that up, but for some reason she couldn't say anything. It was a touchy subject to her in many ways. She only heard rumors about it but never any concrete facts, and when it happened the first time she thought she was seriously injured and about to die. And it didn't get easier after that either; it was a grim reminder to her that she could never be like her brother, and that she would be stuck with the wrong set of chromosomes for the rest of her life. She did accept that part of her eventually, having decided to prove herself to be strong despite being a girl, but nevertheless the topic brought painful memories back that left her stunned.

"They are," she finally managed to say, but fortunately the other girl already moved on to the subject of Akame and that they should follow her. Since she knew the flaming senior, it was fine to trust her, and so Elise followed her, having also transformed back into her uncomfortable borrowed clothing. She was happy about getting the kill, though, and bragged about it to Izumi with a grin. "Did you see how I absolutely wrecked that Primy? Bastard never saw it coming, heh."

[Spriggs27]

As they followed the new magical girl that arrived to the scene, Izumi felt a little doubtful of the new girl, she felt that the girl could be leading them into a trap or could be leading them away from the other magical girls and away from the school instead of to safety and their friends, but when she started to see Rea, her feelings of doubt and distrust for the new girl began to vanish, she held a tight grip on Nanako's hand as Elise began to brag about chopping up the primordial." Yes, very great, you murdered a beast that was immobilized and frozen, the only thing that could have stopped you would've been a dull blade. The death of that one was like kicking a near death creature, or pulling the plug for a sick person." Izumi spoke with a high sarcastic tone that it was obvious that she was being sarcastic." Next time start the fight and finish it, don't be a janitor and hit the scraps of someone elses fight." she told the taller girl berating her.

[Flamelord]

Miyako continually attempted to focus on her lesson, in spite of the Contractor making it difficult by seemingly choosing to berate and insult humanity at every opportunity. And surprisingly, she was starting to find it annoying. Honestly, no one was making him be here, much less around her. Couldn't he go find someone else to bug if he was just going to badmouth the species he was trying to recruit?

She did respond though, eventually, and in a manner continually aimed at not drawing attention. "Surprisingly, they can't teach something they don't know. And since some of us here aren't a hyperadvanced alien species, you're just going to have to live with it."

That said, she turned her attention back to the work at hand and proceeded to ignore the Contractor, as if that would make some sort of difference to the way things currently were. If he wanted to ramble on then she didn't care, since she was determined to get a good grade in the science that humanity actually understood right now, in spite of her claims that it was wrong.

When lunch began, Miyako pulled out her bento and prepared to go find a place to sit in the cafeteria when she was approached by someone else. She looked up in her seat at the girl, a smile finding it's way to her face as she made herself as friendly and agreeable as she could, just for a situation like this.

"Thank you," she said gratefully, taking the handbook and putting it in her bag. She then gestured to her lunch, before nodding in agreement with the request. "Go ahead." She certainly wasn't going to stop the class representative if she wanted to sit with her.

The last comment though took her off guard, a look of surprise flicking across her face before fading away back to normal as she glanced down at the Contractor. "Sorry," she apologized. "It kinda snuck into my bag." Which was a variant of the truth, but she felt it best to hide the reality if the Contractor wasn't going to approach this girl at the moment.

[MarsAdept]

Rose followed slightly behind Akame as they walked to find the other magical girls. She calmed herself as much as she could. Akame did not have to avenge Emiri, Rose silently swore that she would be the one to avenge her. Rose realized she was looking at the ground, so she looked up to see the other magical girls. Rose saw Elise and kinda tilted her head. Elise was wearing some of her cloths. One of her favorite skirts no less. She did not have the same figure as Rose. The sight of Elise brought a smile to Rose's face and Rose busted out laughing, "Elise, Blue is totally not your color. I am not opposed to you borrowing my things but wow!"

Rose leaned against a wall laughing. Slowly and almost abruptly, Rose stopped laughing. Rose suddenly gained the most serious of expressions. Her eyes were filled with anger. Coldy yet calmly, Rose spoke to every magical girl in earshot, "I visited Emiri's residence this morning. I found her to be no longer among the living. Stab wound to the chest did her in."