BrokenPromise

Symphony on High

The doors to the great escape swung open, and Raphael the Righteous Hearted filled the door frame. This was only his third visit, but he was already accustomed to bowing his head to get in the door. When he traveled abroad, he found that few doors were as large as that of a cathedral or church. That was to say he got a lot of practice not hitting his head on things. If anything, he was happy that the doors were so wide. Smaller doorways necessitated that he step through them sideways.

Once inside he found most of the usual suspects. It seemed like Regina was arguing with someone every time he came in. The little detective was giving another girl an interview, and there were a few other familiar faces he couldn’t quite name. But Marrie Knight was absent. They had spoken previously, but he had hoped to encounter her again. No matter. She was keeping him updated as requested. He trusted if it was important she would have told him. His main reason for being here today was to speak with Elroy, who was exactly where they met last time. He was seated in front of a giant table with a half finished cup of orange juice.

”Hey Ralph.“

”Please do not call me that.“ Raphael did not wait for Elroy to give him permission. He took the seat directly across from him and placed his massive hands on the table. ”Did any of the freelancers get back to you?“

”About what?“ After thinking a bit, he knew what. ”The Gemini operation? Just a little bit. Apparently it was pretty classified. So long as everyone got paid and a vampire didn’t get anyone, I’m not going to pry into anyone’s affairs too much.“

”You’re already joking about Patricia’s abduction?“

”She’s fine now.“ Elroy drank the rest of his OJ. ”Without a sense of humor, a freelancer won’t last long in this profession.“

”Then maybe you can find humor in the fact that a group of nuns attacked the freelancers. From what I understand they managed to kill one of the GEMINI espers.“

Elroy groaned. ”I know it wasn’t you, but that does sound like an Inquisition hit squad, doesn't it?“

”I wanted to tell you in person I had nothing to do with that.“ He folded his arms. ”I am curious about them though. To my knowledge, we haven’t had any rouge actors recently. Certainly not that many. From my understanding, at least one of them was in Pax Septimus before my arrival.“

Elroy leaned in. ”Old rogue actors?“

”Unlikely.“ Raphael shook his head. ”We do not take defectors lightly, for the very reason that they tarnish our reputation. It’s not all that common an occurrence really.“

”Don’t you have a database or something you can look through? I mean, you’re Raphael the Righteous Hearted. You’re pretty much the big cheese, right?“

”Unfortunately, it’s not that simple. The Holy See has a large influence, but our reach is limited. It might surprise you to know that many of the Inquisition’s Espers are freelancers. Vatican City is small when compared to the world, and we can’t spread our espers that thin.“

”So if these nuns were just temporary volunteers, it would be hard to tell if they ever worked with you?“

”I am good with faces. If they worked with me in the past I would instantly recognise them. But I am not the only missionary for the inquisition.“ He sighed. ”And on that topic, I was wondering what you thought about working alongside me.“

Elroy sat up a bit straighter. ”You want to hire me?“

”I would like to hire a great deal of you.“ He placed his hands flat against the table. ”There are reports of two behemoths headed straight for Pax Septimus. GEMINI has designated them ‘Crazy Train’ and ‘Peace Train’ respectively, and it sounds like they want to destroy them. From my understanding, these behemoths are not as destructive as others. It sounds like Maverick Alternative may wish to pacify them.“

”And you want something different.“

Raphael nodded. ”The Inquisition believes that Peace Train is an angel, and more importantly, a former ally of the church. We give our own designations to behemoths, and believe they might be ‘Holy Roller.’ Crazy Train however is a demon. As such, we would like to pacify Peace Train and bring them back to the Vatican. Crazy Train should be destroyed.“

Elroy exhaled. ”That’s not going to make GEMINI or Maverick happy.“

”It’s more than either of them deserve. In a way, they both get part of what they want.“ He balled his hands into fists. ”I’m not asking freelancers to fight other espers. I just wish for a certain outcome. “

”Tell you what?“ Elroy tapped the table. ”Regina isn’t much for letting stuff live, I’m more of a lover myself. If you put up a hunt on Shimr, you’ll get both of us. That said, I’m not going to personally advocate anyone join the inquisition over the other factions. If they want to join us, it’s going to be their own decision.“

”I suppose that is the best I could hope for.“ He opened up his phone and started typing up a hunt. ”It will be nice to see Patricia again.“

”It’ll be just like old times.“

”Only this time she’s going steady with you.“

”I guess some things change with time.“

Kurai Majokko: Tsundere Gekido

"I just wish they hit me lower…”

— Suki Oyama

Oros dropped her face into the dirt when Acid Drop arrived. Not because she had anything against her, or was feeling second hand embarrassment from her earlier actions, but because it was the only thing she could do to dull the excruciating pain. That wasn’t to say it wasn’t super awkward to have someone you bullied come to save you. Was she really not aware of who smacked her? But maybe it didn’t matter. Tsubomi was all about her duties, so having everyone in fighting shape was more important than any emotional baggage that she should have. Nothing had really changed.

"I’m a little out of breath. I think they were trying to drown me.” She pulled her face out of the sand. It had stuck all over her forehead and cheeks. "If I turn back, I can’t regain my strength. But if we’re really talking, then I’m probably awake enough to- Hurk!”

Suki had decided she was going to ignore Roche when she got back, but she hadn’t expected to get man handled by Rei’s number two. As soon as she was on her feet, she threw the cloak back at Roche, briefly causing it to float in front of her face.

”We’re dark magical girls, for crying out loud!” Suki found it difficult to stand upright. She was hunched over like a hunchback or a terminally online person with horrible posture. Her tendrils flicked in the air. ”If we can’t inspire some terror, then we aren’t trying. I’m sure if we trap everyone we can get them to have a ‘primal reaction’ or whatever.”

For the months that Tsubomi had been dormant, she had gathered a lot of emotions. If she put her mind to it, she could probably cause quite the panic if she so chose. But if she chose to bank that for later, the magical girls would have to explore other avenues for creating mass panic.

Symphony on High

It was easy for an esper in Pax Septimus to find themselves down in the dumps. With a few exceptions, most espers were regular people that weren’t accustomed to dealing with daily life or death situations. Their situations were often complicated, and they took the line of work they did out of necessity or obligation rather than a love for killing monsters or other humans. It involved a lot of complicated feelings, and seldom did an esper leave the operation feeling fully satisfied with the outcome. Often, what gave them the strength to keep going were the people who they surrounded themselves with. Maybe it was family, friends, or even a fellow esper who could understand everything the job entailed. A pillar for a weary soul to lean on. Trixy understood the importance of such a pillar, and tried to be that for as many people as possible.

Though Trixy might have wanted to be that for everyone, many people found her irritating to be around. Most humans at least. Perhaps her rampant flirting was just a bit too desperate. Maybe she had too many daddy issues, and was too ugly to be worth the hassle. Perhaps that was why she ended up joining Maverick alternative in the end. Monsters just understood her better than people did.

That seemed to be the case with the Bastion’s newest additions. Boteg was a golden dragon that seemed like he was scared of most paranormal entities, yet was fiercely protective of Amanda, another new addition. It wasn’t confirmed yet, but she was the offspring of two relatively strong monsters.Neither of them were fit for combat, but in time that would change. But Trixie wasn’t here to train them, nor did she really care about how strong they may become. She was going to be Amanda and Boteg’s friends. So far, she had been knocking it out of the park.

She felt, anyway.

Boteg, Amanda, and Trixy were all gathered around a plastic folding table. They were playing Uno, which was a game neither of them were very familiar with, but Tetrad had played it with Trixy a few times. What made this game special was that it was the first time Amanda had offered to play with her, rather than wait for Trixy to invite her to play.

”You didn’t say Uno!” Amanda tapped the draw pile while giving Boteg a firm stare.

The dragon, who was presently human up to his neck, folded his arms. ”Me thinks thou rule is most strange. Little scare heard me say ‘last’ did thou not?“

”But that’s not the rules!” She poked the pile again. ”Maybe you said something, but it wasn’t Uno, and it has to be Uno!”

Boteg gave Trixy a pleading stare, but he wasn’t going to find much help there. She gave the dragon a pained smile. ”You know Boteg, I think the way you sound is really cool, but you do have a habit of taking what people say and distorting it. We’re not picking on you, but it might be worth trying to say the right word as an exercise.“ The dragon only groaned in response before taking a few cards. He had yet to win a single game.

”Me thinks you made up that rule to prevent me from winning!“

Amanda laughed. ”No! It really is in the official rules!”

It was nice to see that Amanda was able to laugh. Unfortunately, living vicariously through other people was all she could do to feel happy at the moment. With a sigh, she played a card. ”You’re up, Amanda.“

”Are you okay?”

”Yes?“

”But you sighed.”

Trixy held out her hand. ”I’ve got seven cards, I don’t think I’m winning.“ she said before playing one. Not that six was any better.

”You sighed before I came to get you too.”

”I finished working out.“

”You don’t work out.”

”I just started.“

”Trixy…” Amanda lowered her cards. ”I wanted to play with you today because you seemed a little… Agitated? I don’t know, but I was hoping you could tell me. Boteg agrees with me.”

”Grinning scare is not grinning today.“ the dragon noted.

Trixy sighed, again. She had been cornered. This card game had been a way to get Amanda to open up to her, and it seemed like Amanda was using it to get to know Trixy better. She didn’t mind that, but of all the things to ask about…

”You sure you want to know?“ Amanda nodded. ”Alright, well to start, I’m not exactly lucky with my love life. None of my dates ever go anywhere.“

”I remember you coming to Dante’s a few times.” Amanda answered. ”We never met, but I was always in the back room. You came often enough that I remembered you.”

”Okay.“ Trixy decided not to bring up the fact that her waitress had been kidnapping her dates, many of which were still MIA. She also decided not to get into how the waitress was dealt with by Finn and… ”I met this girl though. Woman, I guess. Really cool person, super chill, and a total super cutie.“ Even now, thinking about Klava’s beauty brought warmth to every part of Trixy’s being. ”But she’s been MIA for a while. I think she might not be of this world anymore.“

Amanda froze, taking far too long to consider her next words. ”This wasn’t Klava, was it?”

Trixy knew that Amanda was aware of who Klava was, or more importantly, that she had assisted gear boy on a job. Denying the woman’s identity would have been the best for keeping the peace, but she cursed her weakness. ”Yes. That is her name.“

”She’s alive.”

Trixy blinked. ”Excuse me?“

”She’s alive.” Amanda repeated. ”At least, she was as of last week. My father placed a curse on both Klava and Time Keeper. I was in her dreams about seven days ago, so she might be missing, but she’s alive.”

”You didn’t get any hints to her whereabouts, did you?“

”Sorry, not really. But isn’t there a detective esper in Pax now?”

Trixy nodded a few times as a smile spread across her face. ”Well, I’m glad I decided to talk to you about that! Thanks Amanda! I’ll have to look into that detective later.“

”Don’t mention it. We’re friends, right?” Amanda played a card.

Boteg eyed the card for a moment, and then a devilish smile crossed his face. ”Thou hath forgotten to say ’Uno!’“

A Question About Tabletop IntChecks

@Cleveraptor I don't think you're going to have a lot of luck with your endeavor. Generally GMs have a particular game world in their mind that they wish to tell their story in, and they won't accept a character as-is that was made without knowledge of the setting. Certainly, it's a huge ask to expect a group or GM to base their world around the ideal character you want to play. It smacks of "I want to play an RP my way, but I'm too rigid to bend to anyone else's desires."

That said, There's no rule forbidding an interest check like that. So... Try it?

Kurai Majokko: Tsundere Gekido

"Laser propulsion doesn’t work like that though!"

— Sink Queen

"Take care lovelies! And don’t worry about me, I’ve seen a few monsters in my time."

Before Felix could respond to Nyxia’s surprise apology, she blasted off. The laser was there one moment, and faded the next. Sink Queen squinted her eyes until the light faded out completely.

How curious. She should make a call.

Among all of her effects, there was a waterproof phone in a pressure resistant case designed for diving. She fished it out of her bag and speed dialed someone.

"Hello, it’s me. Just calling to let you know… Yes, I know you told me they would be here. I just thought you’d like to know I made contact… I was surprised. I don’t know many magical girls that would go to the beach to hunt miseria, let alone the ocean. Interesting folk this lot… Yes, I put them on the right path. Time will tell if they get anywhere with my advice. If you don’t mind me asking, how did you know they would be here?... I didn’t think you two were on speaking terms. Haven’t spoken to her myself in years… Of course I’m going to keep watch. I need to see how this all plays out… Alright, I’ll let you know if there’s any developments. I’ll talk to you later, Ashley. Cheers." She turned to Felix and smiled. "You might want to sit this one out, rascal."

---

”Three of yas against one o’ me? Dis almost ah fah fight!”

— The Magnificent Morganite

Morganite was pretending to look at her wrist watch when Acid Drop came out of the waters. By the time she registered what had happened, Acid Drop’s fingers were already around her neck. Touch based magic was always potent, but Morganite refused to let this girl fully take over her emotions a second time.

Size was never a good metric for determining a magical girl’s strength. She peeled Acid Drop’s fingers off of her neck. Then she spun, and the centrifugal force caused Acid drop’s limbs to extend before she was released, and soared through the air like an out of control flying squirrel. She hit the water soon afterward.

And then blasting across the water were the other two magical girls, uniting them all together. Maybe it was the diffidence coursing through her head, the fact that they were all together, or both, but Morganite recovered her shields and began to speed back to shore.

This didn’t stop the duo, who were determined to ram into Morganite at full speed. Roche called for more power, the distance between them closed.

But then…

"TF2_FRYINGPAN.MP4”

— Suki Oyama

Oros bobbed out of the water, gasping for air just before Roche and Nyx rammed into her back. The front of the shield was pivoted downward. Roche took Oros underwater again, and Nyxia was launched into the air. Since she was creating thrust, she shot herself into Roche’s back, causing them to tumble underwater. By the time they climbed out of the water, Morganite had made herself scarce.

The blood witch was delirious. Between oxygen deprivation and blood loss, her body collapsed as soon as she pulled herself out of the ocean. "Am I unconscious? Does someone need to give me mouth to mouth?” The fresh wound in her back had spawned four tentacles, which she used to create a sort of parasol.

Kurai Majokko: Tsundere Gekido

"Look! Tsubomi’s awake!”

— Suki Oyama

”Noice try but dat ain’t workin’ again!”

— The Magnificent Morganite

Tsubomi, or rather Acid Drop, would not have much difficulty finding the scarlet harlot or the pink pounder. Oros had made herself a surfboard. She propelled herself along with spinning tendrils that behaved like a thruster. Morgan was using one of her shields as a surfboard, while the other was spinning behind her like a water wheel. A very fast water wheel that didn’t appear to be attached to anything, but was still propelling the magical girl forwards. Fascinating…

On land, Suki was an exceptionally fast magical girl. But her current setup couldn’t match her skates on land. She turned to face her pursuer with a sneer. Morgan was still smiling. They both swung their hands at each other. Each one managed to catch an incoming fist with their off hand. Their propulsion device lashed out next, with Oros’s tendril coiling around Morganite’s shield. It may have seemed like they were evenly matched, but Oros the Joyful was straining to hold Morgan in place, while the light magical girl looked less interested in pushing through and was instead assessing her target. Her eyes moved all over Oros before her smile vanished.

”Oi! Ya look a a tad familiar doncha laddie?” She raised an eyebrow. ”Have we met before?”

"Hell of a pickup line!”

With a roll of her eyes, Morganite’s shield spun. It severed Oros’s tendril and flew into her stomach. High enough to miss her emblem but still hitting hard enough to throw her. Morgan hopped off of her shield, and it swiftly flew behind the airborne magical girl, catching her before she flew too far away. Before Oros could even start to fall, the shield surged forward, forcing her to belly flop against the water before she disappeared under the waves. Before Morganite fell into the water, her other shield replaced the one under her feet. She gazed into the depths, but all that Tsubomi could see from where she stood were some bubbles floating to the surface where Oros had gone under.

Morganite kept her posture straight, her gaze downcast at her struggling foe. Light girls were a valiant and honorable bunch, but there were few people they despised more than dark magical girls. You never knew how far they were going to take things once the fighting started.

Symphony on High

"I want the car fax."

— Mika Fang

Mika probably should have been back at HQ. But after completing her reviews of the freelancers and porting them over to Binky, her superior accidentally spilled the beans. Binky had mentioned that Ashley’s team had run into some trouble, and that Fritzi was thinking about promoting the high tech heroine. But Mika was no fool. She knew the doctor had wanted to promote Ashley for a while. On paper it made sense. She was the most senior member and did exactly what Fritzi wanted. But it was too early and unearned. A rank bestowed out of necessity rather than Ashley’s ability. Oh how Mika seethed when hearing her name. She knew she couldn’t keep her cool if such a thing came to pass. But as bad as returning to HQ would be, she also didn’t want to go home to an empty house with her thoughts. So she volunteered to join the clean up crew that Ashley had dispatched. Mika hadn’t been harmed during her last operation, and she had a bit of mana left if something happened. It was a hard offer for HQ to turn down. They still needed to recover cry baby Finn, and the other espers weren’t in the same fighting condition she was. Having an esper around to deal with stray monsters would be a boon. Her wish was granted, so long as she didn’t get into trouble.

But Mika wasn’t just trying to skip out on witnessing Ashley’s promotion. After her outing with Estelle, she figured it might be wise to visit the operation area before some monsters came and leveled the place. She had gotten a chance to look around the church, but she was sure that the agents at Dante’s hadn’t been the most thorough. Prior to her talk with Estelle, she wouldn’t have been either.

The non-esper agents immediately went to work surveying the diner for damage. Not just structural damage, but PR damage as well. Two men were talking about possible vantage points and one had mentioned a nearby orphanage that might have heard the battle. But none of that mattered to Mika. She was a slayer of monsters, and she was only here because there might be some clues that lead to bigger, more important things to kill.

Mika was cautioned not to disturb the scene, but there was nothing to disturb. It looked like a bomb went off. There were bodies everywhere. Along with blackened furniture that had all been overturned. Even the church didn’t look this bad, and that had been the home of a mad cultist before nuns fired smoke and fire everywhere. She wouldn’t find anything here, and she knew it.

But the back room…

The back room split off two ways, both of which seemed to be untouched by the skirmish out front. One door, oddly, led into a boy’s bedroom. Or at least it looked like a boy’s bedroom at a glance. There were posters for retro video games as well as some punk rock bands. But the longer she looked at the room, she noticed that the musicians were all from boy bands, and many of the games had cuter aesthetics that most boys wouldn’t be into. There wasn’t a lot of furniture, and the only appliance in the room was a giant flat screen TV that was wired to a game system. In truth, Mika was a little envious. Su never let her decorate her room the way she wanted to. Probably because it would look like a kid’s sticker covered lunchbox if she did, but that was beside the point. Though Mika did notice there was no computer, which gave her a strange sense of pride. Su had wanted to teach Mika about computers, and even went as far as building her one so that she could get acquainted with all of their parts. She wasn’t sure if she could build one by herself, but the one she had would be good for years to come.

The other path lead to an office, which also housed the security equipment. There was also a door leading out back, but there wouldn’t be anything out there. Mika went to look through the surveillance footage, but there was nothing interesting. There was no sound, it was all black and white, and the cameras inside the building were inoperable or of such poor resolution that she couldn’t see what was going on. Alls she really knew was that everyone was talking and then Finn entered the front of the building. Mika audibly groaned. Why had Ashley decided to send Finn through the front? It didn’t make any sense, and was just one more reason that this promotion was poorly timed. Why not go through the back? Of course as Mika asked herself this, she realized that the security system was pretty well set up for the back entrance. She didn’t feel this invalidated her question.

The only other interesting thing in the office was the fax machine, as there was no computer. Fax machines were really weird, weren’t they? Digital information was so malleable and easy to share, and with a fax machine you could take that digital content and print it on a physical piece of paper, at which point it lost its ability to be easily moved across cyberspace. That seemed like a negative in almost every way.

There was no paper shredder, but there was a waste paper basket, which Mika dug through. Something that had bothered Mika about her operation was that the nuns were able to prepare for her arrival. She didn’t know about her mission until just a day ago, so how were they able to prepare so fast? And if Mika’s operation had been leaked, then had Ashley’s operation been leaked too?

Mika found a crumpled up piece of paper in the waste paper basket buried under a half-eaten lunch. When she unfolded it, she could see a picture of Finn and Timekeeper printed at the top of the page, followed by a brief description of his abilities.

Yes. Yes it had.

Kurai Majokko: Tsundere Gekido

"You might not like it, Nyxia, but this is what peak aquatic performance looks like."

— Sink Queen

The squid girl surfaced as soon as it looked like the others were going to do so as well. She did so with little flair, simply gliding through the water until she reached the surface. There was no bombastic splash, nor a ripple that wouldn't instantly vanish in the torrent of surfacing bubbles that Roche had created. Only her head and shoulders rose out of the water.

"Cheerio! I hope Felix didn't startle either of you. The bloke likes to wander off and explore, but he's harmless."

"I just wanted to clean myself in peace..."

"Anywho! Name's Sink Queen around these parts. Wasn't expecting to get any visitors out here. Don't suppose you were searching for buried treasure were you? The bones of that ol' ship have been picked clean years ago."

The dark magical girls informed the squid girl that they were here hunting for miseria.

"Terribly sorry loves, but there's no miseria out this time of day. Not usually. While the little rascals like sites of tragedy and the sort, what they really feed on negative human emotions. The reason why miseria come out at night is because humans are so much more susceptible to negative emotions before they sleep. All the bad that happened throughout the day is confronted when they go to sleep. That's not to say they can't be summoned though. Doing so in a place like this is sure to guarantee a strong one shows up. The people on the beach are having a good ol' time. If something were to strike terror in them all simultaneously, you'd be sure to have one hell of a miseria on your hands!"

March of the White Rabbit: A Roll-Your-Own Magical Girl Roleplay

"Boy, I sure hope I recognize my GF when she comes back!!"

— Chloe Irving

For her part, Chloe had everything ready. Her mint operatives were in position, the Ossiarch Bonereapers were poised to strike, and… oh! She had encountered Oros once and she had said a lot of gibberish. Some of it related to her sword and how easy it was to spy on events. The story slayer sounded like a similar blade, so she continued to put her surprise out of her mind as she had for the past few days.

But it was boring to sit still and wait for things to happen. Part way through her preparations, the bottle she had wished for changed into a pendant. She hadn’t thought much of it at the time. She was too busy pulling strings here and there to bother with it. Though she had started to wonder if something had happened. Maybe the queen of hearts had finally taken out the wish granting magical girl. She held the pendant in her hand and rubbed it between her finger and thumb. Her third eye fixated on its magic.

Magic welled up in the pendant and a stream of magic poured out in the form on sparkles. It was clearly not the same as what the bottle emitted before when summoning the djinn. In the ball of magic fairy dust, Ruby tumbled into existence and fell onto the floor. ”Aaah, humph!” Balled up in her long cloak and skirt it took the woman a moment to orient herself and sit up. ”Ugh, oh. Hi Chloe.” She would give an awkward smile.

Chloe’s eyes darted between the newly arrived woman and the pendant in her hand. She did this several times before placing her hand over her face. "Again!?” She ran her fingers down her face. "I get it. Aurora switched up her look and so did I, but don’t you think you’re overdoing it a little bit? Maybe limit the whole transforming thing to once every other visit?” she looped the pendant around her neck and extended a hand.. "The only reason I’m not upset is you still look cute.” Chloe grinned. Of course, it was good to see she was still alive too.

Accepting the help back on her feet, Ruby pat herself down. It was like she was coated in glitter. Thankfully it did not stick to everything and dissipated as it scattered around her. ”Ah, well thank you.” She would beam from the complement. ”Though I’m not really sure what happened to be fair. I think I’ve become a fairy godmother?” She would pull the hood down and work on untangling her hair.

Chloe, for all her faults, was far too classy to use the opportunity to call Ruby a fairy god MILF. But she did think about it. "At least you know what you are. I mean, for the moment.” She reached up and pushed Ruby’s hair out of her eyes. "Anyway, I’m getting a little fidgety having to wait for everyone to start. I figured we could have a little bit of fun until we get the signal. Heck, maybe we can have even more fun after the signal.” she nodded to herself. She guided Ruby to the front of her army. Or at least part of it. The front line was a few mortek guards with necropolis stalkers just behind them and immortis guards just behind them. But to anyone else, they would just say there were a lot of skeletons of various sizes standing in rows. "What do you plan on doing once the fighting starts?”

Ruby looked over the army silently. She didn’t realize Chloe had access to such a thing. Not that it really concerned her at all. Plenty of forces out there after all. ”I will be keeping an eye on my own magical girl. I’m not sure how much I can contribute aside from helping people with their wishes beforehand. Though not everything people want directly helps with what’s coming.” She would observe.

"You’d think we’d take this a bit more seriously. Even now, everyone’s out for their own interests.” A more ironic statement Chloe could not speak, and she knew it. The corners of her lips curled into a smile. "To be fair, the outcome doesn’t matter too much to some of us. I don’t know if we’re going to repel the wonder chumps or not, but this is a battle I can’t survive.”

”That’s ominous. Why is that?” She would look a little concerned. How does one respond to a statement like that?

"I didn’t mean that literally, but….” Chloe took a moment to think. "I’m not exactly everyone’s favorite magical girl. As much as I hate to admit it, Penny wasn’t totally wrong when she said I failed upwards into a position of power. She was just wrong that it was the Mint and that it hadn’t happened a long time ago.” She waved her hand at the skeleton army. "My patron isn’t someone you should really screw around with. But I’ve had a change of heart recently and I think we’re going to reach an impasse pretty soon. They want Penrose really badly. Like really badly. But I’m not going to give it to them.” She shrugged her shoulders. "I’m not totally doomed though. I’ve got the Mint at my back and a few close friends. But Nagash isn’t the type of guy you just smack in the face and expect him to go away. Once the wonderland thing is done with, my trials will have just begun.”

Understanding what Chloe meant, Ruby would nod. Penrose essentially dragged conflict in from practically everyone. Even those who seemed intent on protecting the city had trouble cooperating at times. ”Well, I can do my best to help you with that. Maybe some of my good PR can tip the scales and get us a better deal.”

Chloe smiled. "I appreciate the gesture, but I’m a little skeptical about the odds of the magical girl community coming to bat for me. I mean, yea, we’re all fighting wonderland right now, but that’s to protect our home. I think it’ll be a lot harder to convince everyone to help the coin broker get away from a necromancer. And this is no ordinary necromancer. This is a necromancer who learned how to do the whole spirit/resurrection thing better than his god of death could. So, as a mortal, he killed them and absorbed their power.” She sighed. "We can worry about that later. It’s kind of awkward to have this conversation in front of his minions, you know? I mean...” she looked back at the bony abominations. "Few of them are truly sentient, but the point is that I really called you over here to have some fun! I know I brought it up, but we can talk about my problems later.”

”Fine by me. What did you have in mind?” She would walk around so that Chloe would turn away from the army.

"You have someplace to be later, right? We could make out until then.” Chloe groaned.
"No, best to do that after we've won. How about we set up some 'fireworks' to aid with the distraction? Aurora should be just about ready, but it never hurts to add more!”

All the better to kiss you under, my dear.

---

”Don’t mind me, just MDP’s imaginary friend.”

— KoT

”That's right! I'm totally real now!” Just like an imaginary friend, 'Ashley Washley' seemed to appear out of nowhere. Unlike an imaginary friend, everyone could see her. ”And now that I have a physical body, I'm not about to let the queen take it away from me.” She made a gun finger and shot at Connie. ”That, and you guys are MDP's special friends, so I have to do my best to protect you.”

The only way Mac could combat her urge to cringe was to try and be cringe herself. But boy was MDP outclassing her in that department...

Kurai Majokko: Tsundere Gekido

"For a beach episode, nobody’s doing a lot of beach stuff.”

— Suki Oyama

Suki had seated herself on the edge of the giant rock. She kicked her legs in the air, her eyes not really focusing on anything. Tsubomi was probably still behind the van, and the other two were probably making out underwater or something. That, or Nyxia was hunting miseria while Roche, in a strangely subservient manner, just quietly followed like the training wheels on a unicycle. Since Roche was as flexible with her leadership position as stale cheese, the former was far more likely to be what they were doing.

You know what? Screw this! If Roche and Nyx think they could have sexytimes while she and Tsubomi set up for their queen, they had another think coming! She had pranked everyone on the beach, it was time she pranked the sea.

With a stern face, Suki marched into the ocean. Her summer dress swayed in the sea breeze as the water crept up her ankles.

…

…

…

Tsubomi’s sudden revival caused everyone around her to hop backwards. They asked her if she was alright, the stud even apologized, but she ignored them. That included when they asked what had been scribbled all over her face.

Nyx and Roche had not returned. The only visible member of her party was Suki. Or was she technically Oros now? Hard to say. She was clearly in magical girl form, but the red dress and sun hat made her look like an entirely different magical girl. But Tsubomi was too familiar with her to ever mistake those dull red eyes for anyone else.

But Suki wasn’t going to get to the ocean. At least, not before something else reached her. A pink and silver bolt screeched through the air as it closed in on Suki. Unlike Tsubomi, she was aware enough to turn and face the incoming threat. She stepped off to the side just as the bolt “unfolded” and swung one of its shields. The ground detonated, making a splash and throwing wet sand in every direction. Suki rolled across the beach before standing up and looking at her attacker. She froze.

”Awe yas! Fighty time now!”

— The Magnificent Morganite

Morganite laughed. ”Das right, red head!” She placed her hands on her hips. ”You juz got rolled by the magnificent- She stopped when Suki made a mad sprint for the ocean. ”Oy! I waz talkin’ to yah!” The armored gremlin took off after her.

---

The chase would not last long.

As terrifying (yet clean) as the creature was, it was only a little bit faster than its pursuers. A squid could move at speeds faster than an olympic runner, but magical girls were not limited by things like physics and even causality. It also didn’t have any real defense mechanisms other than threatening to call the “bobbies” as it surged on.

Nobody knew the exact depth they were at, but there was just enough light to see a silhouette of something in the distance. At first it looked like a squid, then it looked like a girl. But as they drew closer they realized it was a squid girl.

A squid girl in a diving suit with a crazy number of gauges. It seemed pointless to have so many references for pressure, but magical girl outfits weren’t known for their practicality. That said, she had two oxygen tanks, weights, too many carabiners, flood lights on both shoulders (they were off), but the funny thing was she had no helmet. The deep diving getup went right to her neck, and then she had an eerie visor that she wore above her eyes and her rebreather rested below her neck. Though instead of legs, she had a slew of tentacles. So the idea of a sea creature needing diving equipment at all was a little silly.

The small squid creature floated up beside her and appeared to communicate with her. She looked at the newly arrived magical girls with some interest, and nodded back at her underling.

”My queen is willing to surface and have a conversation with you.” the squid-like creature was hiding behind the squid-girl while it “spoke” to them. ”But you must not harm me. I am not miseria, and you will gain nothing from killing me.”