Savannah - pigoseg - Mahou Shoujo Madoka Magika (2024)

Chapter 1: Cherishing Flames Themselves Divide

Chapter Text

The engine was dead. The pistons were blackened and burst, the rubber crisped, the bottom of the hood fuzzy with accumulated soot. Grease pattered from the dregs of the engine block in shiny silk streams, where it crept into the dirty frayed shoes of the Magical Girl Hollis, who hung above the catastrophe wringing her hands and licking her lips and bitterly cursing the fateful world.

One hour and change ago the effective second in command of the Charleston Three, Yolanda Bedlowe, chugged into the front drive with their collectively owned car, a red minivan, in tatters around her. She caught Hollis near the front door in a deck chair, hunched over a melted freezer margarita, unable to escape. The exchange lasted a sum total of thirty seconds: Yolanda hopped out (the door creaked and dangled on its hinges) and leaned around the car, cascading corns of glass out of her fishwire hair. "Hollis, you handle this."

Hollis swallowed. "Uhuh."

"Don't tell Dyson," said Yolanda, and then she was gone.

It was possible Yolanda was senile in a different way from the rest of them. This wasn't the first time she'd appeared in such a state during their Georgia tenure, though the desolation of the minivan was a unique and interesting spin on the tried formula of grievous injury. There was a story behind it that nobody except Yolanda would ever know. Like the time she came back home blasted to hell with shotgun pellets. Says she didn't see who did it. Hopeless to wonder. In Savannah Hollis learned that prediction was a crapshoot - the city gnawed up certainty, sanity, and dignity. What little they already had.

She rolled the minivan into the garage, opened the hood, and there discovered the horror, aglow with the tail end of a stopgap enchantment courtesy Yolanda. Tally the necessary cubes, devastating. Then she slouched out of the garage and through the front door and past the living room and Dorchester vegetative before the T.V. and passed again with a plastic tub of cubes in hand, unnoticed. She balanced it on the frame of the engine compartment.

Hollis' power was that she had a little brown bag which produced tools, parts, and useful objects. She had to take them out one by one, cube costs scaled with complexity so she couldn't haul a full engine block out, and despite the package deal including roughly exhaustive usage standards, she first had to identify what to withdraw. Problem: Hollis did not understand engines.

It sweltered in the garage, and her outfit, a draping of generic grey robes, trapped cells of heat right against her skin. She padded the sweat on her brow, lucky to correctly replace one faulty part a minute. It couldn't last - she began to ball up her fists, adrift on the concrete. The cubes themselves dwindled - she'd have to eat into another tub, which would turn the inevitable lecture into a browbeating. Hollis could picture it, actually she could picture nothing else.

"f*ck you," she wheezed, which didn't help.

She paused in the center of the garage, vision pickled. The engine sat prettied up with far too few magical additions to make a difference. Hollis eyed it up. She was thirsty. She'd left her margarita and deck chair abandoned by the front door in the rush of things. She decided - she'd go and get that margarita, and she'd relax for a while. In the name of just this goal she stepped out of the garage and saw the chair and the drink and the unfamiliar Magical Girl standing next to it.

Hollis was only a few inches from the garage, and even though the girl was already looking at her she tried to dart back. The result was a stumbling retreat that ended in tragedy when, still watching the girl, she bumbled directly into the edge of the garage's mouth. She almost fell, recovered, jerked her bag close to her and groped inside it for a pistol which obligingly began to form against her fingers.

The girl had to this point been motionless - now she reached out. "Wait."

Hollis didn't wait. She drew the gun - a piddly little revolver - and warded it in both hands, cringing so hard it hurt to stand. "What's your problem, what do you want. Get the hell out of here."

The true purpose of this string was to buy her time to think. The girl was already transformed, she had a silver sash and a fur coat and a short scepter (or a long wand?) Ring any bells? No on the outfit, but Hollis did have the slightest inclination on that face, though it was narrow and blank here where in the picture she'd seen it was photogenically cheerful. She'd committed that picture to memory by pure virtue of having seen it so much - it was a still shot of ten Magical Girls next to some nondescript brick building, lodged in the bowels of an online article titled Georgia USMF Makes Great Strides.

Oh god. The minivan. Hollis blinked wildly. Yolanda actually went and did something. And it was right there, they had to know.

The girl clicked her tongue. "Calm down. Didn't Kyubey tell you?"

"What? What?"

"That we were coming. The meeting."

Hollis recalibrated. "Uh."

"We moved it up a little. Kyubey said he'd tell you."

Bastard. Hollis bit her tongue. Weasel bastard rat f*ck. Just like him. Why had she trusted? Why, why?

"Listen," said the girl, "You'll be there?"

"I don't know. I have to talk about it. With the others." She had not yet lowered her gun.

The girl squinted. "Sure. But you can convince them, right? We've got an understanding?"

What did that mean? Hollis stared.

The girl soured. "Whatever," she huffed, and from nowhere produced an index card and flicked it towards Hollis (who winced and almost pulled the trigger, the card bounced off her shoulder). "There's the address, we'll be there at five. You should come, alright. It's important."

"Yeah. sh*t, yeah." Hollis stepped back a pace and finally stowed the pistol. A long silence gestated, and Hollis felt, as the receding wave is overtaken by the inbound one, the urge to reclaim her dignity: "You've said your thing, get out of here. This is still ours so you know."

"Calm down," said the girl.

Hollis bristled. "Get gone. This is our territory, you respect that."

The girl shrugged. She shifted feet, loitered, looked down beside her, and nudged Hollis' drink over with a grey silk boot. Its contents slipped out like a translucent green amoeba. The girl looked at Hollis straight and finally stepped back and with a flourish of her scepter and a flouncing of her coat little stormclouds amassed at her feet and buoyed her up, over the nearest houses, and out of sight.

Hollis had never been the glory of the Charleston Three. Dorchester and Yolanda were the Northern queens, and when Hollis clasped her own power close to her chest it was the glory of a toady and mule. A totally different kind of loss. But in this moment, Hollis may have felt just a little of the gawping, yearning horror that the others must have lived with since coming to Savannah. You have fallen never to rise, and roots will encase you.

She went back to the garage and knelt before the altar of the hideous engine and probed her forehead so hard it hurt.

Immediately to Dorchester? Make the move now? Hollis couldn't bring herself to it - too much too fast. And she needed information anyway. To process. "Kyubey, get out here."

A padding of paws settled above her.Yes, Miss Ames?

Hollis raised her face from her hands and saw the pale form there atop the grill frame, composed and lifeless like a plush hood ornament. The lone bulb in the ceiling burned around him. "Kyubey." said Hollis. "What the hell. Explain this. Explain this to me."

Unfortunately, the local USMF chapter has recently decided to formally claim this city. I was unable to advise them otherwise.

Hollis chewed her lip, she twisted and squeezed her hands. "When."

They adopted the decision a few days ago.

"You could have warned me."

It wasn't necessary.He walked delicately back and forth above her.You should relax, you seem to have handled the situation well.

"Bullsh*t, that's such bullsh*t." But she already saw it, Kyubey's hell logic was in force. She tried to recalibrate. "What else is there. Tell me what else."

Nothing within my knowledge.

"I don't believe you."

That's unfortunate. However, I believe you will still act as we have discussed. Despite your current posturing to the contrary, you're more rational than many humans. I would be very surprised to see you sacrifice this chance.

Hollis shook her head. She couldn't think, the heat was in her flesh, her fingers shivered. "What about the pickup? Is that still happening? Or are you screwing me there too."

As I have said, there are no complications at this time. Once you are away from Miss Bedlowe and Miss Malecki there should be little chance of disruption.

Vague, vague, vague. Hollis sagged. "You're hiding something."

No. I simply don't want to promise anything outside of my power.The Kyubey tilted its head.If you're so concerned you may dissolve our agreement at your leisure. However, I was under the impression that you wanted to escape as soon as possible. Is that no longer true?

"Don't ask me f*cking questions like that." Hollis rose to her feet and tried to loom over the rat, but immediately, shamefully fell away and took to pacing. They'd hang her entrails from the trees. How had she ever thought any different?

Miss Ames. If you can't control your emotions you will surely put yourself into unneeded danger.

"I'm already in danger. I'm in so much goddamn danger you don't even know."

You are inflating the situation. The only complication is a lack of time to prepare: you have already prepared, have you not? All that remains is the execution, which should pose no challenge at all. You really should have more faith in yourself. Everything is in your favor!

Hollis just let him rattle on. Eventually he vanished. Hollis brought out her Soul Gem, cleaned it with a few cubes, and tossed them to the floor - they conspicuously disappeared when she wasn't looking.

She was as calm as she'd ever be. If she was going to move ahead it had to be now - another minute and she'd reconsider and never work up the mettle again, stuck with the putrefying corpse of the Charleston Three until it ate her alive. It had to be now.

"Dorchester," she called as she came into the living room. But Dorchester was asleep, her posture listed over treacherously onto the arm of the couch she had melted into, her arm cast over her eyes. What was visible of her face was pallid and drowned, washed in blueish specters from the flashing television.

Hollis hung near the vagrant form - she wouldn't approach. "Dorchester," she said.

A murmur, a continental stirring. Dorchester's arm toppled from her face. She turned her head into the couch.

"Dorchester, we've got a problem, you need to get up. Get up."

Dorchester sniffed. "Ames," she said. She refused to call anyone by their first names - it had been a miracle to get her to stop using dead Charleston titles.

"Get up. Come on." Hollis stepped back even as she said this, she slid behind the protection of an errant coffee table.

"Quiet," said Dorchester.

Hollis was quiet.

Dorchester slid up straight, aligned herself, ground her eyelids with her thumbs. It failed to do anything but accentuate her decay. Dirty t-shirt with insipid meme cat branding, along with black sweatpants - both of these she'd worn for a week straight. Her eyes were sunken and red. Her hair was in tangles. When she ran a hand through it her fingers caught and she hissed and tugged them out and looked lost.

"What," she finally said.

Hollis told her that a Magical Girl had arrived from the USMF and told them to meet, presumably about their stay in Savannah. She provided the index card and the time. She didn't mention Kyubey or Yolanda's van.

Dorchester nodded. "I see," she said. "And where is Bedlowe?"

Hollis said she didn't know.

"Well call her."

So Hollis brought out her bag and dug out a phone (pretty pink with glitter and rainbow decals) and called Yolanda. The phone rang one, two, three times. Dorchester took the opportunity to crank up the volume on the TV - tinny newscaster bullsh*t polluted the air. The phone picked up. "What's up," said scratchy Yolanda.

Hollis repeated the story a second time.

Yolanda said something indeterminate. BUT COMMUNITY LEADERS SAY, said the TV. Hollis controlled herself. "What was that?"

"I said yeah I'll be in a bit. I'm busy."

Hollis clicked her teeth. "You need to be here now. What are you doing."

"Hunting."

"You aren't hunting, I can't hear you hunting."

A huff drifted through the line. "I'm staking it out. Got some good vulnerable wraiths here. Get up out your own ass and chill, I'll be there in like twenty minutes."

No use in pursuing this. Hollis lowered the phone and dispassionately attempted to catch Dorchester's attention. "She says she's hunting."

Dorchester waved for the phone, Hollis handed it over. Freed of her burden she slipped into the open kitchen and made herself a drink, another frozen neon affair. She returned and sat on the edge of the coffee table and ate spoonfuls of crystallized pseudo-wine while Dorchester commanded and asserted into the phone. Eventually she returned it. "She wants to talk to you."

Certainly. Hollis raised the phone to her ear. "Yes?"

"Alright I'm on the way, just so you know we're missing out on about fifteen easy wraiths, Dyson wouldn't hear it, I think it's a damn shame you know. Anyway listen, why I wanted to talk with you, is the car fixed?"

Hollis looked into her glass. She ran her tongue over her teeth. She hung up and dumped the phone into her bag.

Ten minutes later (ten minutes of awkward staring, Dorchester watching the TV, Hollis obliged to do the same) the front door banged open and in came Yolanda. She was in all respects a generic rogue - she trailed a red scarf and had a restrictively slim gambeson-skirt-thing as her two primary points of costume inventiveness. Her Gem, a ruby, glinted on her left forearm. Her robin hood boots clunked into the living room and stopped. "I'm here."

Dorchester made an arcane gesture. "Sit down."

Yolanda did, right beside Hollis, who shifted and took to her half full glass with feverish hunger. Yolanda gave her an eye. "I saw what's outside."

Hollis stared stupidly at her. "What?"

Yolanda clapped her on the shoulder, tapped the rim of the glass, winked like she was in on something. This had not been an issue in Charleston, where in fact Hollis drank more - and better quality - than she ever did here. But now alcoholism was a sign. Hollis smiled in pain, Yolanda didn't notice, she had moved on to Dorchester. The TV blathered. Dorchester reached for the remote.

"Hey, turn that down would ya Dorchester," said Yolanda.

Dorchester worked her jaw for a long moment, then turned the TV off entirely. Yolanda did a thumbs up. Dorchester blinked. She was lost, thinking, maybe debating a violence play. Hollis panicked and cleared her throat. "Well what do we think?"

Dorchester set herself upright and looked no less haggard. "Of course we'll attend."

Of course. Hollis fiddled with her spoon.

Dorchester went on: "On our last departure we faced them with honor. I see no reason not to do the same again. If we don't see them face to face how can they treat us seriously?"

Hollis squirmed. "I think we should just leave, personally."

"As cowards."

"As," Hollis reached, she couldn't find it, the moment lingered, "As smart people. Prudent people. They might have a trap or something." If Kyubey could be trusted this was entirely untrue - caught on her feet, Hollis was already pulling things out of her ass.

Dorchester waved a hand. "I doubt it, but if so we'll certainly rise to the occasion."

Hollis looked into her glass, it was half melted, mounds of ice descended. Why couldn't she say anything? "But they'll beat us. They've got how many Magical Girls, ten."

"The risk is negligible. What do they stand to gain from fighting. Nothing. You are being paranoid."

Hollis didn't speak.

Dorchester took this as affirmation and turned, inchwise, to Yolanda. "Do you agree, Yolanda?"

Yolanda ceased picking her nails long enough to shrug. "Sure. I'd like to see them. I'd like to talk with them."

"Well."

"But on the other hand it's just a lot of trouble. I kind of don't want to screw with it. So."

Dorchester got that look again, not great, but here was a moment. A glimmer of hope ignited inside Hollis, she leaned forward. "Listen. Why don't we just leave, okay, just pack up our sh*t, no time for them to pull any funny business, get to uh Dallas, set up there," the spiel was out of her control now, the point had fled, "Start doing like the old days, and we don't have to bother with these f*ckers anymore. Okay. How about that. How about we do that."

"Well I could take it or leave it," drawled Yolanda.

Dorchester shook her head. "You'll leave it."

Hollis swallowed. She was suddenly thirsty, but her glass had disappeared.

"We have to make a statement. What you're saying, Ames, what you're saying is we do what they want. Do you think they want to meet us? No. They're rats, they're awful Magical Girls, and they know they don't deserve this city. They'd like us to just disappear so they can come in without having to see the real owners. Because they know this is wrong. But I'm telling you, I'm not willing to vanish. I won't. I will make them see me. And so will you."

Her speech was dead monotone, which contributed to but was not responsible for the project of making it almost incomprehensible to Hollis. Hadn't Dorchester admonished her a sheer minute ago for paranoia? Didn't even matter. Hollis could wrap her mind around the last part, the part she needed to. Dorchester was Decided. Okay. Okay okay okay.

"Does anyone wish to challenge me?" said Dorchester.

Oh no. Of course not. Hollis bowed her head suitably.

"Bedlowe?"

"You've convinced me."

"Good." Dorchester stood, shakily. "Ames, call Imler and Addicott. They are to come with us when we leave. Yolanda, put our things in the van. We will leave once the meeting is over. Don't come to me if it isn't an emergency. I need to think."

"Yes," said Hollis. Yolanda saluted explosively. Dorchester nodded, stepped away, and mooned deeper into the house.

Hollis took to her task immediately, but Yolanda did not, having found herself with the responsibility of the broken down van. This bothered her not at all - she hummed and chattered as she fluttered over the scoured engine weaving half-baked enchantments. She was more than talkative enough to infringe on Hollis' very thin patience, thinner than ever since Sophia Imler wouldn't pick up the phone. This was the third attempt. The line buzzed. No end in sight.

Hollis had very little need for either of the two remaining Charleston vassals - Imler a vapid little bitch and Ryatt useless - but in this moment she had shifted down the gradient of hate. Other things, more important things, she needed to talk to Kyubey, she needed to plan, she needed to prepare for the meeting and reevaluate her escape and figure out how to maneuver herself so it didn't all fall apart. But no. Let's wait for Imler. Good god, let's wait.

"No luck?" chirped Yolanda when the third call dropped.

f*ck you. "No," said Hollis. She called again.

"Sorry to say but I'm rooting against you. I think it's better if we never see her again, don't you? What a sanctimonious girl. Way I see it this is a great excuse to lose her. Though," she flourished a hand, her voice rose inquisitively, "Obedience is important. You hate to see her just get off easy, right? If you look at it like that she should stay with us after all. I can't decide what's better. Can you?"

"Be quiet," said Hollis, who was trying to squint through the dial tone.

"Don't mind me at all. I'm just thinking aloud, you know. I wish you'd gotten this thing fixed. I mean I don't blame you really, but wow, tedious."

Hollis mumbled an apology, the response to which: "Nothing, not at all, I'm happy to do it, my fault anyway right?" A beautiful sentiment if she hadn't kept meandering after the fact, now about Dorchester ("Dyson seems real tired lately don't you think, I guess she's getting all bent out of shape about this.")

Hollis survived until, miraculously, the call landed. There was a sigh. "I'm sleeping, what do you want."

Sleeping. Incredible. "We're leaving today. You're coming."

"What?"

"Listen to what I say. The USMF are having a meeting, we are to attend, we're leaving afterward, we will retrieve you on the way out at our convenience. There will be no questions, you won't resist. Do you understand?"

A lip smack. "Not really."

Hollis sneered. "Yes you do. Don't screw with me."

"I'm not screwing with you, Hollis. I'm just waking up, I'm telling you I don't get it."

She hung up. Next call Ryatt the mushroom girl, who answered within two rings. "Ryatt, get ready, we're coming to pick you up this afternoon, we're leaving. You comprehend that? We're leaving."

Ryatt did not comprehend it. She mumbled and slurred aimlessly.

"Listen to me. Answer me. I'm telling you-"

"Tell her I'll wreck her sh*t for free," called Yolanda.

"I'm telling you to answer. Unf*ck yourself and answer."

Fifteen seconds later (Hollis marked them as she paced, onetwothreefourfivesix) Ryatt returned with an apology and an excuse: "I'm all messed up right now."

What did it mean? No time for that, no time. Hollis stepped out of the garage and muddled before it, Yolanda raised her voice to be adequately heard, Hollis would not hear. "Can you understand my words? Tell me."

"Yeah. Yes. I'm sorry. I hear you."

"Okay," she gestured violently as Yolanda whooped, "Then understand that we are coming to take you tonight, and if you aren't ready then you're still coming. We'll drag you out, do you get me? Just like Charleston."

"What?" Alarm thickened in Ryatt's voice, it took to the sluggishness like acid. Now she was f*cking paying attention.

Hollis moved to finish up. "Be ready and don't be a problem. Goodbye."

"No, wait, what about my car? I have a car."

"I know you have a car. You'll ride in our van."

"No wait wait. Can't I drive with you?"

"No."

"But my car."

"Shut up. Goodbye." And Hollis hung up.

As she stepped back into the garage (thumbs up from Yolanda, 'screw her right') she received a call. She answered. "Hollis I'm sorry about that, just please tell me what's going on. You're the only one who will. If I try anyone else they'll just come after me. I don't know what to do. I'm sorry I was slow before. Please."

Hollis hurled the phone spinning down the street - it hit the ground and burst into clattering chunks. "Wasteful!" commended Yolanda. But Hollis just hustled into the house. She could make another f*cking phone.

Things needed to be packed, and Hollis was the only one left. She attempted at several points to pass it over to Yolanda, but Yolanda was of course engaged, "Implementing her technique" and such. Hollis had hoped to make use of the privacy of the garage, but fine: she could do what she needed to while she was packing. She did fix herself a drink first.

She only had herself to blame. None of the three had much in the way of possessions save the roomful of guns, grenades, and miscellaneous weapons that Hollis had created since their arrival to Savannah, in the spirit of preparedness. Even culled the bulk would crush everything else, so Hollis moved it first, mostly in boxes since she'd had the foresight to put pistols and such away, but the larger pieces, light machine guns and .50 rifles and so on, she had to carry one by one. Even so ineffectual a Magical Girl didn't need to worry about fatigue, so all that remained was boredom and the distant activity of organizing things so that it would all fit in the back of the minivan. She could only last so long.

Halfway through the heap of bristling, bulging containers Hollis stopped, looked around the house (was Dorchester still brooding? Yes she was), returned to the room, and cleared her throat. "Kyubey."

He did not appear.

"Kyubey I need to talk. We have a problem."

A smooth eggshell head emerged from one of the boxes.I cannot attend to your needs so frequently, Miss Ames.

Hollis sniffed. She hunted for her drink, which was nowhere in sight. "It's going wrong."

It is not. In fact, I believe I advised you that this was probably the form proceedings would take. It isn't indicative of the danger of your course that you failed to comprehend my warning.

"Dorchester and the USMF in the same room. She'll start a fight, I know it."

There is only a negligible chance of conflict - it's in neither party's interest to elevate the situation further. Indeed, you are currently the most dangerous part of your own plan. You'll sabotage yourself if you don't control your emotions.

Hollis discovered her drink in the living room. It had melted, she took a deep swig, it clogged her throat and she coughed. She couldn't think of anything to say, and when she went back to the boxes Kyubey was gone.

What had she expected? He was probably pretty much correct, when you got down to it. Hollis was cracked. Her worldview had never been durable, and ever since the move to Savannah it teetered, a great glass construct swaying on the lip of destruction. Now it tilted again, only Hollis wasn't sure it could restabilize anymore, not with the genuine danger of the situation, not with growing chaos, certainly not with a helpless present of moving boxes and waiting, just moving f*cking boxes while other people did other things and thought other thoughts, and all of this so sensitive, important, explosive.

She drank the last of her glass. No energy left for it. But boxes remained.

The rest of the weapons went into the minivan. Then, possessions. Most of these were also packed, though she did have to venture into Yolanda's strewn hovel to pick out valuables (after checking with Yolanda of course - she assented: "There's some stuff under the mattress, you should go on and get that." When Hollis did so she discovered a pistol that she had made, a shotgun that she hadn't, and a pile of various gem necklaces and rings, two that closely resembled Hollis' sapphire Gem. All of it went into a nondescript box, and Hollis refused to think about it anymore.) Presumably Dorchester had her own menagerie, but she was holed up in her room and Hollis dared not even near the door. She topped off the pile with the two remaining tubs of grief cubes, right in the back for easy access, and after making sure that it all fit and closing the hatchback she went for another drink, only to find, upon cracking open the freezer, that no pouches remained.

Somehow, this news broke Hollis just a little bit. She meandered around the kitchen, glass in hand, chewing her lip. No more alcohol in the house - Dorchester wouldn't allow it, and Hollis had never thought to sneak any in, fearing discovery. But something needed to be done. In desperation she settled for tap water. It was syrupy and it tasted like mold. She went back to the garage.

It seemed Yolanda was in the final stages of her hack job on the minivan. Much of its body was straightened and sparkling garishly, held together exclusively by enchantment, sans the windows, which hadn't left pliable remains.

"How about it," called Yolanda from the driver's seat. She revved the engine, red sparks spat from the tailpipe.

Hollis shrugged.

"I think it'll last a while. You'll need to fix it still, sorry about that."

"Sure."

"I'm taking it for a ride around the block, while we wait for Dyson and all. What say you watch."

"Sure."

So Hollis sat outside the garage, nursed her tepid water, and watched Yolanda drive up and down the street. The car slid and careened, more due to artful implementation on the part of the driver than the remaining damage. It plowed into a mailbox, which bounced off the hood like a beachball and crumpled in someone's lawn. Similar scenes repeated themselves. It could only be malice. But this paltry entertainment captivated Hollis. Her old glass, the one the USMF girl had spilled, was still lying on the drive. She got up and took it to the edge of the road. When Yolanda next made a pass she tossed it underhand. It struck the hood and burst, shards rained, the minivan swerved and stopped.

"Holy sh*t," hollered Yolanda through the absent windshield. Cuts nicked her forehead and cheeks and neck, welling blood. "Good shot Hollis!"

Hollis sat back down. She could make the run right now and probably get away with it. Right now she could do it.

Yolanda pulled the minivan around and with an inarticulate yell hurtled down the street. Hollis watched.

Yolanda settled down after a few more circuits. She left the minivan parked in the street and leaned against it to complain about her circ*mstance: "How much longer do you think Dyson's gonna be? She give you a figure in there? I'm bored," she added.

"I heard what you heard," said Hollis.

"Sure sure. I just wonder what's taking so long. She did this back in Charleston, you know?"

"Yes."

"It's weird."

"Yes." Hollis sipped her water. Half the glass gone and no ill effects yet, presumably for the same reason she could never gather a properly lasting state of drunkenness. She knew a girl that would boost detergent off of supermarkets, to 'get tough.' Something was obviously wrong, she got the Cycles soon after Hollis beheld her, but the basic principle was accurate: it sucked, and you survived. The bad sh*t mattered a little less every time.

"How about," posed Yolanda, "How about you go check on Dyson."

"Okay," said Hollis. She got up and went inside. She didn't intend to actually bother Dorchester. Her thought was, she'd hang around in the house until things got underway. Maybe stick by the hallway and listen, see if Dorchester was moving around at all. Play it safe. Hell, wait on the couch.

But it didn't work out like that, because when Hollis stepped into the living room she saw Dorchester right there, standing in front of the TV. She faced away, swaddled in the crimson folds of her cardinal-esque getup. "Ames," she said.

"Yes."

"Tell me the time."

Hollis dug out a new phone from her bag. "Ten till four."

"Okay." Dorchester nodded. "Give me a moment. I'll be out shortly." She went to the couch, picked up the TV remote, weighed it in her hand.

Unpinned. Why stay? But Hollis went flat on a wall. Dorchester turned, angled the remote, and flicked it into the TV screen, where it shattered the glass and zipped through the plastic and came out the other end as a cloud of grapeshot while the TV tilted and toppled.

She continued. An oven door went sailing across the house and lodged in a wall, sticks of furniture airborne, a countertop twirled like a discus, a couch thrown end over end - and then she started in on the walls. She kicked through drywall, batted aside support beams, waded through the wreckage, her twig legs plowing straight through layers of heavy debris. As the minutes passed and the ruins piled and Dorchester's gaunt thousand yard leer failed to wane Hollis started to fidget.

But finally Dorchester seemed to reach satisfaction. She extracted herself from what had been Yolanda's room, stepped up to Hollis, turned around to view the destruction. The frame of the house creaked. She snapped her fingers, and from thin air sprung a parched scroll. She stretched it before her and whispered something vaguely latin and with a flourish of her hand pointed to the nearest pile, which erupted into flames. She paused to see that it caught and brushed past Hollis out the front door. Hollis took a sip of water and left the house.

Yolanda was still leaning on the minivan. She made stupid fingerguns. "Heard you guys had some fun."

Dorchester looked over her shoulder at Hollis. "Time."

Four-fifteen. Hollis said as much.

"Bedlowe, drive, Ames, get in the car. Don't say anything. I need it to be quiet."

Yolanda saluted, she winked at Hollis, she slid around the back of the minivan. Dorchester took the front passenger seat - presumably Hollis was meant to sit in the back. She moved to do just that, but as she opened the door something cracked behind her and she looked back on the house already collapsing, fire gurgling out of the open front door, collapsing what it touched to ash almost instantly. Surprisingly little smoke or sound.

Hollis had found this house - she'd scouted it out, ejected the destitution, invited Dorchester and Yolanda to take over. She'd been disgusted by it ever since. This suburban limbo, this joke of an area, finally abandoned decades past its expiration only to be inhabited once more, reanimated, tormented. An awful, trashy locale that she'd never been at home in. Good to let it burn, probably, but…

"Directions," said Dorchester.

"Yeah. Yes." Hollis got in and closed the door to the blooming heat. She dug in her bag and took out a phone and checked to be sure that it was ready (it was, a hot pink line ran through streets and roads, estimated time thirty minutes) and passed it up to Dorchester. She leaned back in her seat, Yolanda goosed the gas, the minivan lurched, objects shifted and clattered in the back, and they went. An afterimage of the conflagration hung in the windshield. It shrunk, it receded from view.

As they left the suburbs they passed: wraiths clustered in the shade of a doorway, a bulbous white mass in a lawn chair, uncountable empty houses and yellow lawns. A man with a rifle watched as they went by. Animated rags shuffled around on the hot sidewalks. Others bustled over a dead body in the center of the road. Yolanda swerved to hit the mass, the wraiths split away, the corpse remained. Thump thump. Hollis winced.

There was doom in the air - mark it by the faux new car smell, fruity and sticky, and by the light that radiated from a perfectly blue and perfectly flat sky.

Her skin itched. She'd been transformed for hours, but pointless to change back now, pointless and flagrant, and flagrancy was a crime, so there she sat, and looked out the windows, and picked at her fingernails until they bled. Everyone was silent. Dorchester brooded over the phone as it chirped "Fifteen minutes remaining!" in the cheerful cadences of Hollis herself, one and a half years dead.

They entered the city. Streets shortened and pinched. Cars amassed. Yolanda was forced to slow down. "So hey Dorchester," she said, evidently bored beyond pretense of respect, "What's the plan? What are we doing? What are you thinking of?"

Dorchester glowered.

"I just figure it's better we know in advance. We've got what, ten minutes, eight minutes left? I just think it'd be useful."

"We need to be strong," said Dorchester. "We need to intimidate them. That means unity."

She appeared satisfied, as if she had stumbled onto some deep and widely applicable truth. Unity. Of course.

Yolanda took them around a stalled truck, the occupant of which hustled with a pair of jumper cables, waving frantically, peering at the shadows between buildings. "Well sure yeah. I'm just thinking how."

"Follow my lead."

"That's all?" She didn't wait for a response. "What do you think, Hollis? You weigh in."

Hollis swallowed. "I think we should be respectful to them. And we should tread lightly. All due respect, Dorchester, I don't like any of this. I think if we're going in there we should be as small as possible. Personally."

"Seems fair, seems fair. Dorchester?"

"I think," said Dorchester, "That both of you are becoming insolent and that you need to learn your place. I am the leader of this group - you have no power or sway. Negotiations are impossible. I've told you what's happening, so you obey. I find it interesting that you've forgotten. I admit that I've been less diligent lately about making examples, since I don't have the energy to address every idiotic mistake and slight you make. Maybe I should change that? Maybe I should invest a little. You've obviously forgotten my strength, Bedlowe. Should I bring it back then? Should I show you? I can do it right now."

Nobody said anything. Hollis bowed her head, she fingered the door handle, escape was inches away but miles apart.

"I can do what I need to. You may think I'm ineffectual, you may think I'm dense, but if you have illusions about the pecking order then I'd like you to think about Colleton. Very illustrative."

A hot minute since Hollis heard anything about that. Just another one of Dorchester's old territorial claims, owned by a particularly annoying vassal. Colleton pulled some indistinct jape on Dorchester - Colleton disappeared. Hollis had doubts it was much more than smoke and mirrors: suppose Dorchester had killed the girl, wouldn't Kyubey have taken umbrage?

That being as it might, could Dorchester back it up? Maybe, maybe not. Best apologize in any case. Hollis gathered herself. "Dorchester, I'll submit to whatever-"

"Of course you'll submit. I'll make you submit."

Hollis pinched the back of her hand and decided to be silent.

Dorchester huffed. She flicked her hand in dismissal. Yolanda seemed to understand the gravity of the situation and kept her peace, though when she saw Hollis peeking up at the rearview mirror she did a cheeky wink.

They turned onto a wide road, open and empty, tiny buildings with massive parking lots for foundations as far as the eye could see. The phone twinkled: "Your destination is on the left!" Hollis peered - ahead about half a mile away and approaching fast, a sun beaten coffeehouse. From the roof hailed a pink donut creature with vast googly eyes. The array of surrounding parking spaces was entirely empty, as were all others. Nothing moved. Even the cars on the road had fallen back, as though warded away by the stalking malevolence that increasingly hung in the air, portending death and sickness. Yolanda swung the minivan across the road and bumped into the lot, the quaint shop loomed, its ceiling length windows black to rebuff and isolate. She stopped beside the building.

"Okay," she said, "So we need to intimidate them, cool. Weapons out?"

"Use your judgement. Ames, come on."

They organized themselves naturally on the way to the door - Dorchester first, then Yolanda, then Hollis. Dorchester rolled her shoulders back and assumed a shred of quiet dignity, while Yolanda slouched as though melting. Hollis picked at her robes, she shifted them, she itched. Dorchester looked over both of them, lingering on Hollis a second more like she'd spotted something wrong. Then they went inside.

Hollis based her expectations on that press piece, Georgia USMF Makes Great Strides, ten girls and the factual regurgitation and the cute little nods, 'these young soldiers are up to the task', etcetera. Ten girls was on the higher end of the old groups, more and cohesion began to break. Intimidating, absolutely. Certainly beyond the Charleston Three's offering. But you could wrap your head around it. In that way it was a comforting number, especially in comparison to swelling California hordes, the congregations in Washington, the conglomeration of impossible numbers of Magical Girls in every corner of the world. And importantly, a backwater like Georgia couldn't have much more to offer. The numbers would remain within reason.

Last to enter, Hollis believed until the last moment, when appeared not ten girls, but twenty. They lounged in chairs and leaned against walls and looked up from tables, a calculated semicircle facing towards the door, sinking onto the entrants. Glances were thrown, whispers slid across the floor. Dorchester often favored similar tactics for breaking in vassals, the wall of faces padded with chumps, the mafioso bullsh*t. Familiarity or no, and Hollis lowered her head and made small.

In fitting with the formula was a frontfacing speaker. She even looked a little like a movie Don - she had that pasty face, that thick pseudo-smile, though the overtones became confused with the cane and wide brimmed preacher hat. "Well hello. Glad you came, I'm told that wasn't certain."

Dorchester responded a few seconds off cue. "Who are you."

"Penelope Schuman. I'll be your liaison for the day."

Another silence. Dorchester's muddy eyes roved. "What does the USMF want with us?" she finally said.

"Well, Savannah, obviously. Besides that statements mostly. An understanding of the situation. However you can help."

Dorchester cleared her throat. She swayed a little. Yolanda, standing immediately behind her, caught Hollis' eye. She mouthed something, but Hollis didn't quite see, distracted by the vision, in the far corner of the room, of the girl from before - stormclouds. She appeared to be pointing. At who, exactly?

"Now," said the hat girl Schuman, "Before we get this started let's establish some things. You seem well adjusted so I take it you can extrapolate, but let's get it out there so it's said, since some people have problems with this. You're leaving of your own free will. You have no more claims in this city, or this area. Since you're leaving peacefully there's no need to pursue anything further, but that will change if you misbehave. Do you understand?"

"Yes," said Dorchester.

"It gets bad for you if you try to pull something. We're very fair. Much better than anyone else you'll find. But there has to be agreement."

"That makes sense."

It was of distant interest that Dorchester just rolled over. Babytalk ought to have killed such a prideful girl. But maybe she'd used up her steel: maybe she'd wizened to some of the things lowly Hollis knew. A sudden attack of rationality could be nothing but good - the only downside was the inevitable recidivism. Maybe Hollis could escape before then?

"I guess we'll get on to questions. Just a few, so bear with me, Miss Dyson? Dyson Malecki? That's your name, right?"

Dorchester tightened measurably. "I go by Dorchester."

Schuman nodded delicately. "Your old holding, right?"

Dorchester said nothing. Yolanda signaled with increasing desperation, drawing eyes away from the central spectacle. Hollis ignored her. The stormcloud girl, she had a drink. A margarita? Yep.

"Alright Dorchester, so just to confirm, you and your friends do plan on leaving soon. And those are Miss Ames and Miss Bedlowe, who are in our presence today, and two others who are not. That's Miss Imler and Miss Addicott. Correct?"

"Yes."

"Do you foresee any issues, should we take this city? Do you have any complaints?"

"I don't."

Something tapped insistently on Hollis' shoulder, she winced away, Yolanda was right on her. Her face loomed grey and indistinct in the dimness, and her thick caterpillar smile worked in an arcane language. Hollis tried to get a grip. "What," she whispered.

Yolanda nodded. She patted Hollis on the shoulder and slid back and returned to her place, apparently content.

No time to comprehend - Schuman looked past Dorchester, at both of them. "You girls are in agreement with Miss Dyson?"

No response forthcoming from Yolanda. The responsibility fell on Hollis, she fumbled it, finally: "Yes, I am, I support her." And then, for no reason at all, except maybe the humiliating middle school show-and-tell aspect of this whole horrible thing, "Ma'am."

The assembly rustled. Schuman raised her eyebrows. "Well."

Hollis dug a fingernail into her palm, the pain acute. f*ck you f*ck you f*ck you.

Dorchester seemed to feel the same way. She curled up standing, head bowed, eyes closed, breathing very softly. Usually a damning prophecy, but as it built and built no culmination neared. Was Hollis satisfied to see Dorchester trapped in such inaction, isolated with her rage, simmering in indignity and bound by capricious forces? Maybe a little.

Schuman nodded, slowly, like a tumbling iceberg. "How about you, Miss Bedlowe. Do you agree?"

"So," said Yolanda.

Hollis didn't pick up on what this meant. Had she been paying attention she might have had time to prepare, to understand the terrible thing and intercede. But she was distracted - the stormcloud girl's eyes, her palm oozing, hazy notions of an actual plan crystalizing in the back of her head and slowly eating her soul. Too weak to beat against the current, fatigued beyond reason, she decided that she was probably safe. Here was why you never made that mistake:

"So," said Yolanda, strutting forward to supersede Dorchester, "I don't actually think I am."

Dorchester gaped. Schuman blinked languorously. "Go on."

"Well, I've been listening to what you have to say, and you know, it really rubs me the wrong way. So disrespectful. Aren't we all friends? Aren't we all sisters? What happened to that thing you guys were going on about? Bright future? But it seems to me,"

"Bedlowe," hissed Dorchester. Hateful urgency on a girl who was never scared.

"It seems to me," continued Yolanda, "That you're trying to intimidate us. And I don't know what's gotten into Dorchester, but I don't take that. I have my pride."

Dorchester stepped forward. "Bedlowe!"

"Let her speak," said Schuman. And as Dorchester teetered on her feet and glared for some reason at Hollis, now bewildered, grasping at the sudden tension of the situation unsure of what even occurred, how it turned around so quickly: as this happened, Schuman said, "Is your pride worth causing a problem?"

Yolanda beamed. "You wouldn't get it. Magical cop looking ass. You wouldn't understand dignity at all. We held Charleston for a year, you know, but I wonder if any of your crowd had territory at all, before it got all easy to mooch and sh*t. How about a little respect?"

Schuman smiled. "Our dignity is better than that of bandits and murderers."

Yolanda waved a hand in disgust. "See, you don't understand. We protected our territory, law of the jungle and that. It was honorable."

"That wasn't what I was referring to," said Schuman

Yolanda didn't respond immediately. It all came into focus, this was the moment, any longer and it would all spiral out of control. Mindless, desperate, Hollis injected herself. "Okay how about we all calm down and get back on track and get this over with."

Eyes turned. Some girls sneered. Hollis looked to Dorchester and found a hateful bird boned mannequin, small in her red robes, eyes ringed deep. Pasty, simple Schuman might have been a refuge, but then she spoke. "Miss Bedlowe and I were having a useful conversation."

Hollis bowed her head. The floor seeped misery. "I apologize."

"I do believe we should let her respond."

"Yes."

"I," said Yolanda, her voice flat, Hollis could tell that the grin was gone and winced in pavlovian horror but did not dare look up, "I think you're bluffing. That's what I think."

Schuman shrugged.

Come on. That little remark had to be bullsh*t, a wide net of sanctimony of the type Schuman obviously loved. But if so, why wasn't Yolanda saying anything in return?

Had she really killed someone? The minivan, crumpled in tatters. Think about it: a few of those dents were very large, and high up on the body too - hadn't the hood been caved in? You could magic away blood with an enchantment. Not that she even needed the car, a Magical Girl could just walk up to a man and punch him in the chest and that was it. Or, or she could borrow one of the many guns in the house, which Hollis never really kept track of. When it came to it, that wasn't implausible at all.

sh*t! Why hadn't she watched closer, why hadn't she intervened? Laziness, complacency? As though it wasn't her problem, as though everything wasn't her problem…

Schuman cleared her throat. "I've made my point. If we're all ready to be civil, we should continue. Are we all ready to be civil?"

The room was horrible and dead. Shadows pooled. Hollis dug her fingernail deeper into her skin, and she backed her breathing down, and she waited for Yolanda. Yolanda nodded and stepped back.

"Okay," said Schuman. "Now, I've got some more questions for you, Miss Dyson, and we can wrap this up."

Dorchester didn't seem to notice or mind her actual name anymore. She glowered at Yolanda and looked at Schuman and sagged on her feet. "Yes."

"What are your observations on the wraith pop-"

Thwick. Schuman's head jerked back. The hilt of the dagger stuck out like a unicorn horn, she tumbled back, she reached up to grope at it, drifted into a girl in a lacey fairy costume, and slid to the floor. She began to convulse. The girl she'd bumped into looked down in horror, along with the rest of the USMF girls, along with Hollis herself. The fairy's face twisted, and she raised a dainty little wand, and a dainty little light sparked at the end.

Dorchester screamed something unintelligible and hateful - Hollis fell back uselessly - Yolanda slipped another dagger out of her sleeve - and all at once the twenty plus USMF girls around them leapt up and pushed off walls and readied swords and staves and guns, and as Hollis cringed the fairy girl blasted off a thin white scalpel ray at Yolanda and that was the cue.

Hollis didn't see whether Yolanda evaded. The moment those twenty girls started closing in she ran for the door, or attempted to, because a few steps in something heavy connected with her shoulder and sent her spinning. She stumbled, caught a vision of what was behind her - flashing lights, Magical Girls spinning through the air - and finally slammed into a wall. She pressed against it, jammed a hand at her waist, finally found her bag and ripped a pistol out. She couldn't steady it because her other arm wouldn't move. Orientation impossible, Magical Girls everywhere getting an angle and baring steel and charging, none of them were coming for her but only a matter of time.

Where was the door? Halfway across the room, somehow. Hollis squinted, she judged the path, no path, all openings were temporary in this labyrinth of bodies and gimmicky magic. sh*t. sh*t!

Maybe she could go along the wall. No, she'd have to. An explosion roared in the center of the room, splinters flew and dust billowed, the crashing descended into an inarticulate shriek, maybe human maybe beast. The bounds of this madhouse only seemed to shrink, she needed to get out before she was crushed, she began to inch down the wall, slow, shivering, waving her pistol around like a schizo because the dust was thicker every moment and she couldn't see anything except flash flash in every direction, twinkles and bursts and sparkles, a disco hellscape in the dirty brown void.

f*ck this. f*ck Yolanda and Dorchester and their lunatic pride, f*ck Magical Girls in general. All Hollis had to do was escape this building and she'd be gone, never to worry about the opinions of psychopaths again, a lesson learned, a whole new philosophy in hand called 'get the f*ck out' which was revolutionary and freeing and sensible with everything she already believed. Just find the door, though the door wasn't where she left it, it wasn't anywhere at all, the dust had consumed it.

Something thumped behind her. She whipped around - in the static a shadow bumbled. Hollis chewed her tongue. No worries, nobody could see sh*t. No worries! Just let it pass.

In the depths of the room someone shouted: "PURGO." A gale rose from the cracks in the floorboards, instantly the dust stripped from the room and collected into a muddy twirling sphere which spun for a moment and vanished. Magical Girls stumbled in half-motion, blinking stupidly, recalibrating. Then they clicked back on and the fighting resumed.

The form, it was the fairy girl, gouged and hemorrhaging at the waist, looking around cow eyed. She turned magnetically to Hollis. Hollis turned and ran.

A sound like yanking up a zipper. Hollis ducked, it missed probably, no time to tell, she whipped around and fired three shots as she retreated, pop pop pop, all went wild. The girl flicked her wand again and Hollis' body faltered and wouldn't move and a pain needle hit her right in the side. She fired again and managed to put a tiny hole in the girl's forehead. The girl faltered woozily, the chance had come, now it was time to RUN-

One of Hollis' molars detonated. It blasted out her cheek, she swore she could see the bright bits of enamel shoot past in the corner of her eye. The pain was incredible, magically enhanced, what kind of sad*stic f*cking power? She staggered, no more momentum, she emptied out her gun, two more bullets, miss and miss. She lobbed it at the fairy girl (tooth fairy, haHA) and made another one, identical. The thrown gun diverted one of the girl's follow up shots at a sharp angle, but the second struck Hollis in the chest.

Pop, went a canine. Hollis crumpled, the girl fell onto her.

No fight: Hollis had never been good at defending herself. The tooth fairy whipped the wand back and forth with one hand, each lash a tooth exploded, each freezing rush of pain an opening for her other fist to beat the sh*t out of Hollis' undefended face. Hollis kicked and squirmed. "Hhhrrgg," she gurgled through mangled lips, near inaudible in the booming confines of Hell. Better to do it this way:HELP

The girl clubbed her across the face, her jaw slipped out of place. Help. Dorchester weak, Yolanda erratic. Twenty Magical Girls between. Just death.

sh*t, no! No no! Hollis bucked, it wouldn't have worked except the tooth fairy was distracted with something, reaching down, and gave her advantage just long enough for Hollis to work her hand into her bag and rip out a pistol and jam it into the side of the tooth fairy's crisp blonde head of hair and unload all six shots. The girl seized up, dropped the wand, and collapsed onto Hollis choking and sputtering.

Hollis found the strength to kick the girl off. She clawed to her feet, rummaged in the bag, lifted out a new pistol, and shot the keening tooth fairy six more times in the back of the head until the noise stopped.

Hollis stumbled uneasily. She looked over her shoulder. Nobody else? If she had time some insurance was useful. She kneeled down and heaved the tooth fairy onto her side, quickly digging up a little glittery bulb on a necklace. Hollis tore it off and stuffed it into her bag and moved to get up and get out. She didn't notice that the commotion had lulled, not until Dorchester's voice (AMES) invaded her head and sent her jolting.

Another look. Sans four of their number wounded and slouching in corners the USMF girls had assumed ground in a rough circle around one of the shattered windows, feinting and adjusting but not moving forward. Hollis peered above their heads and at once saw the reason. Dorchester, side by side with panting and bloody Yolanda, held a Gem in her free hand. She waved it and said something inaudible below the jeering girls. She glared at Hollis.Ames, get over here.

Hollis stepped forward. Glares turned her way, prissy boots shuffled. She faltered, she pulled out another pistol (why didn't she already have one out? Stupid), she saw no in, she dithered.They won't let me.

Dorchester brandished the Gem violently, and this time spoke loudly enough to be heard: "If you don't let her in I'm shattering this. Do you understand? I'll shatter it right here."

Muttering, a sliding of bodies, a vague and thorny path. Hollis crept forward, pistol pointed at the nearest Magical Girl, a sneering ghoul with half a face. She stepped back. No way they didn't try something.

GET OVER HERE,howled Dorchester.

So Hollis bit her lip and hurried on over there. Something touched her elbow midway and she lashed out among a swirl of grey hard faces and broke through to light. Dorchester slapped her scroll through the air and a transparent barrier shimmered in its wake. This many magical girls, they could break it in half in a hot second. The only hope was that they'd stay back for their friend, never a sure thing with Magical Girls.

But they did stay back, enough that Dorchester and Hollis and bleeding, spitting Yolanda could work their way out of the window. They came out into a side lot, inch by inch, backing away from the shadowed chamber. No minivan in sight. Dorchester stared emptily at the closely following USMF girls and raised the gem according to seemingly imagined slights, commanding them to back off, which they did, slowly. As they neared the corner of the building she glanced at Hollis.I saw you take that girl's Gem. Get it out.

Okay. Hollis got it out. The glares instantly focused on her again. She shivered. What next? They were clearly on the wrong side of the building, and who was to say the minivan was still even there…

They rounded the corner, and Hollis looked pathetically over her shoulder. There, only a few yards away. Her head rushed, not just with relief. Wasn't this somehow important? If she got in the minivan with Dorchester and Yolanda after all this, if the dividing line hadn't yet been reached, was there any line at all? But what to do otherwise? Stay here with the USMF, hope that went well? Or steal the minivan while the others were occupied, on pain of the enchantments rebelling against her as an enemy. Yolanda would dispel them anyway - better that all of them get caught than one betrayer escape. All exits covered, all windows sealed. Now that her brain was catching up with the pace of its surroundings, she started to realize just how far it went. Everything in Savannah had always relied on the good graces of the USMF, even her escape from it. Slim chance of that working out now.

Yolanda slapped her on the shoulder, Hollis nearly screamed. Daydreaming, she'd been daydreaming and she wasn't even out yet. She wasn't where she remembered - they were near the minivan, Dorchester and some other girl speaking in a distant tongue, and though the USMF girls were still close a significant gulf had opened, so that it would take them seconds instead of instants to end the standoff. Precious seconds to process this. Disoriented, she looked at Yolanda, who still had a hand on her shoulder, a bloody, ash streaked hand. Sickness pooled. Yolanda was giddy, smiling, saying something very satisfied like a kid eking out a plan on the sly. "Give me the gem."

Hollis shook her head weakly. "No. You'll do something."

"Come on. I'm not doing anything. Give me the Gem. It's fine."

Words could not entrap this horror. Hollis felt the world collapsing. "We can't. We can't mess this up anymore."

"Hollis," said Yolanda, and she grinned like a rogue, like some casanova f*ck, and sure enough, here came the finisher - "Trust me. I'm your friend."

In what world? Friend, like Yolanda wasn't a psycho crazy bitch, like she wasn't the very bane of happiness and prosperity. Friend. Friendo. This, actually, was more than anything else why when Yolanda snaked an arm out and tugged away the tooth fairy's gem, Hollis didn't resist particularly much. She was so preoccupied it didn't register until too late. Any chance of recovery disappeared as Yolanda slid away, holding the gem secure in both hands, hovering at her waist in smudgy fingers. Nothing would remove it except an outright attack - a doomed matchup for Hollis. The great sucking void claimed another inch.

Dorchester raised her voice and came horribly into focus. "How can I be certain? You could easily attack us once we make the exchange."

A voice piped up from the front of the clustered USMF girls - a familiar one. Hollis peered and saw the stormcloud girl standing proud, furry collar apuff in an intangible wind. "Don't play that game. We all saw what you did. You'll still have a Gem left. Give us Miller and we'll negotiate."

"You could rush us in the exchange."

The stormcloud girl shrugged. "Listen, if you want to sit here and wait for more Magical Girls that's fine. I'm just offering you a chance. We'll let you go with Peckenpaugh if you give us Miller, and you can drop Peckenpaugh off once you're far enough away. And if you don't, then we'll hunt you down. How about that."

Dorchester's lip curled and her dead gaze wandered. "Don't patronize me. I'll do what I want. Shut up." She paced, she shook her head, she whirled back to attention. "Fine. Fine. Send someone weak."

The stormcloud girl, apparently the new leader since the others deferred, looked over her shoulder. A thin little weed of a girl stepped forward, looking down, conspicuously intact. She kept her eyes low all the way up to Dorchester, stopped a few feet away, and held out a hand silently.

Finally cooling, Dorchester dropped the Gem into the girl's hand. The body of USMF shifted, the girl skittered back to the front lines, some bloodied heap off to the side hurried up and cradled the Gem in relief. Dorchester gestured tiredly.Ames, give me the Gem.

Well.I don't have it.

What.

Yolanda took it. I couldn't stop her.

Dorchester burned.Idiot. There will be consequences. Bedlowe, you will give me the Gem.

Yolanda, who was giving the USMF girls an eyeful of her teeth, did not react physically.No.

This exceeded Dorchester's ability to control herself. Her entire body reacted in one roiling shiver.I will slay you here. I'll slay you. I'll kill you.

Sure yeah I bet.Yolanda waved a hand as if to paparazzi.I think you're too weak. I've seen a whole lot of words words words from you today, but no goddamn action. Bad enough I had to do your job for you, what does that say?

Dorchester quivered. Her ethereal witch voice seethed,I'll do worse than kill you. I'll rip you apart. I'll burn you. Bitch.

Through all of this predominated deathly silence, during which the USMF girls shifted internally, stared, and surely plotted. One of them had to have seen Yolanda take the Gem, which meant that all of them knew, and Hollis was guessing here, really spitballing, but they seemed displeased with the prospect.Dorchester we should leave.

Dorchester wheeled on her, spluttered, clenched her hands around an invisible neck, wrenched herself back into control with purely physical effort, and as a diminished hunchback turned to face the USMF. "Okay. Listen. Listen to me. We have your friend's Gem. If you attack us we'll do what we need to. Okay? We don't want any trouble. We'll be gone if you let us go. And if you don't then we can make it hurt. We can take our pound of flesh."

"She means," said cheery Yolanda, "That if you come after us we'll crush your friend like a goddamned soda can. Ker-pow."

Dorchester said, "Shut up."

"What my friend here Dorchester doesn't have the cojones to tell all you bitches is that you're small time, pathetic, trash. Now an upstanding Magical Girl I might have a problem snuffing out, but you're just a swarm of ditzy little f*cking gnats. What happened in there is proof, what was that, twenty girls and three on our side and you didn't do it, you didn't get the job done. No honor, no power. Just tragic. I can swat this Peckenpaugh bitch in a second and I'd be happy to do it, be cleaning out this gutter a little for all the good Magical Girls, how about it?"

It didn't seem to amuse the USMF girls as much as it did Yolanda, but nobody got outraged. The stormcloud girl was cool, light on her feet, even smiling a little. The only one truly, irrevocably damaged was Dorchester - she huffed and shifted feet, she sweated and fingered her velvet collar, she matched the eyes of anyone she could and glared murderous hate. Meltdown imminent, evacuate immediately. Hollis retreated and didn't hide it, she backed up against the minivan, so close but could she get inside? She neared the back door.

"Really," proclaimed Yolanda, flourishing the tooth fairy Peckenpaugh's Gem, "This whole arrangement is a mercy for you dipsh*ts. I could pop this girl and mow all you down right now. I might you know. Teach you the lesson Dyson never could. In fact-"

Two things happened. The first was, Dorchester snarled and hurled herself at Yolanda, a blur of magical speed, strange words already on her lips, scroll aglow. Yolanda dodged, a pigsticker knife materialized in her free hand, they squared off.

The second thing: the stormcloud girl flicked her eyes. A miracle Hollis saw it, a miracle that it had even manifested in the first place, probably an unconscious habit of the kind frequent telepathy users usually got. In the last few seconds the USMF girls had receded from Hollis' attention, but this got her looking again, and right when she needed to be, because before her vaguely comprehending eyes five holes opened up in USMF line, and from each poked a long gunbarrel, silver and black and brass, prodding into space-

Hollis lunged, ripped open the car door as she passed, swung behind it. Thundershock - a bullet whanged off of the open door, sent it thumping back into Hollis with a monstrous bulge. She bit the tip of her tongue clean off. Her arm had been braced against the door at the fateful moment, and now it smushed and crackled at the core. She pressed it hard into the door, ground as deep as she could, set her stance hard and wide, and all this done without a thought in the few moments between the first and second volley. It might have been impressive if that second shot hadn't: popped her shoulder in by three inches, torn the door clean off its hinges, and sent her stumbling along the side of the minivan, door still somehow stuck to her pulverized arm, a wide sh*tty shield with two f*ckoff dents. She caught a psychedelic glimpse of Dorchester and Yolanda - Dorchester flung her scroll wide, resummoning her barrier in a crackling flash, hauling Yolanda up literally by the collar - Yolanda, whose feet danced beneath her, who was missing her left arm from the elbow down, who howled, "YOU MISSED, YOU MISSED YOU BITCHES."

Hollis scrambled around the hood of the minivan and dropped the door and ducked low. More pop-cracks, Yolanda raved beneath them, hot magic fizzled as the shield broke again and let in buzzing bullets, one of them skimmed the side of the car and sent metal flakes buzzing. They'd done it, they'd gone and done it, all of them, the USMF, Yolanda and Dorchester, goddamn Kyubey, where the f*ck was he? Everyone just wanted to die, but why couldn't they do it alone? Why drag the people that wanted to live into it? Bastards, f*ckers, wastes - every batsh*t Magical Girl, every selfish stupid human, every conscious thing Hollis had ever encountered, all of them had always been trying to drag her into hell for the fun of it, and look, here she was, they got her in the end.

But no, no, f*ck them. Let them kill each other and break everything and ruin the world. She could still get out, a chance anyway, and better than playing along. You couldn't die with pride but maybe you could die with honor, the only honor left, making them hunt you down. If she tried very hard…

Ames, get over here, help me with Bedlowe!

Hollis spat blood. Her throat was tight.f*ck you.

No response at all. A jackhammer rain thumped into the minivan, four shots maybe, the USMF girls seemed to be missing their targets a lot more now, maybe a better shield? But it wouldn't last, Dorchester could only bring so much magic to bear, and if Yolanda couldn't move then death was all but assured. Minutes left, if that. And then who's left?

Hollis spat again, she cursed, she rubbed her eyes and got up into a crouch and hunched there, sweating. She scooped up the door by her shattered arm, she neared the edge of her cover, poked the edge out, the next barrage cracked but nothing came near. Not that it meant anything, they were probably trying to psyche her out, waiting for her to get out of cover for a decisive blow. She'd get out there and POW, cranially inverted. If they didn't go for her Gem.

On the sixth roaring of the guns she gritted her remaining jawline and whipped around the minivan with only an enchanted door between her and death. She bounded across the distance, passed blood spattered revenants Dorchester and Yolanda, closed twenty feet in one second, and received an off schedule bullet directly to the center of the door-shield. Too much - what was left of her arm became structured pulp as the door burst into shrapnel, glittering across the pavement and through the hot clear air and into the side of her face. She twirled back, somehow on her feet, and unloaded vaguely at the enemy lines. Another USMF girl fired, only one - if Hollis had accomplished a single thing it was throwing the enemy out of alignment - but that one struck true. A baseball hole opened up in her chest and she flew ass over teakettle. The world blurred, her forehead bit the ground, useless instincts gasped. Dorchester and Yolanda were nowhere in sight. They wouldn't leave her behind, right? Not after she'd done this stupid thing for them.

Three cracks - bullets hummed. Two went to anonymous targets, but the third hit Hollis as she scrambled her feet under her and blew out her hip inches away from her Soul Gem. She careened forward and fell flat on her face next to the minivan and busted out more of her teeth, found herself staring at the tread of the back tire, but immediately crawled, crawled, blood foaming from her mouth. She got her good leg under her, reached skyward, snagged the remaining back door, ripped it open, grasped at the seat hungrily, pulled, and had gotten herself partway onto the cool dark floorboard when the USMF gunners got their act together and let off a full volley.

Thwip, thunk, a chunk of her lower spine vanished. Her leg went dead beneath her, she slid back unstoppably, and somehow that finally did it. All that and she was going back. A year and a half of suffering, weeks of mental preparation, five eternal minutes of fear, fighting, and mortal peril, to what end? Perversion. Should have just stayed in your hole, now look how bad it's gotten. Maybe if she had some cubes she could do something, but she didn't, and it was better that way. Every struggle drew you deeper - if you wanted to escape you had to let go…

Someone grabbed her wrist and pulled. Hollis lay limp as she flopped inside.Leave me alone.

No way, motherf*cker.Yolanda. She sounded like she was smiling even over telepathy, the bitch.Sit tight, Dyson's getting us outta here.

Hollis moaned.I don't care. You have no idea how much I don't care. Why don't you let me die?

You don't want to die, if you wanted to die you'd be dead. Now just sit tight.Another grimy hand clamped onto her arm and hauled her in entire.

The next volley whacked into the back of the minivan, which in the same moment revved and galloped forward like a spooked horse, grinding lamely on a stuck wheel, zero to sixty in seconds. Hollis rolled along the floorboard, her pulverized cheek ground into the hard pseudo-felt. Her eyes were sticky and sore.

We'll fix you up right, buddy.Yolanda still held Hollis by the forearm, and now, bafflingly, jiggled it in consolation.We've got the cubes. Just hold on.

'Buddy.'f*ck you. f*ckyouf*ckyou. Die die die.

A distant rumble closed, faster, louder, an undercurrent of snapping firecrackers. She cracked her eyes to the sliver of window above her in time to see a ball of cartoon electricity roar by zapping and licking the air, trailing spectral blue smoke behind. It soared past, and seconds later the air bloomed luminescently. A shockwave slammed into the side of the minivan and raised a groan from the suspension. "sh*t," screamed Dorchester, adding speed.

Hollis swallowed. A few more bullets pinged. They made a turn. Yolanda stared at her, hair all blood-tangled and draped, psycho grinning as arterial syrup burbled out the side of her neck.Don't worry. It's all cool. We're on the way out, no problem. No problem at all.

Hollis curled up as much as the slim space around her would allow, and did not die.

Chapter 2: Out Thy Heavy Mold

Chapter Text

They rode. Hollis didn't see most of it, constrained to the bottom of the car, unable to pull herself up of her own volition. They moved fast, made many turns, some obviously planned, some tire squealing disasters that sent Dorchester into frenzied hissing while Yolanda clucked wetly. The back tire bucked and shrieked, the wind boomed. Hollis stared at ant-chewed crumbs and waited for it to be over.

For about five minutes. If she was still here she had to know. She pinged Yolanda.Where are we going.

But nothing. Hollis peeled the side of her face off the floorboard to stare. Yolanda stretched over between the front seats, peering thinly at the world ahead. She seemed not to have heard, impossible with telepathy. Hollis tried again:Yolanda. Where are we going.

Yolanda blinked rapidly but otherwise didn't move. Her skin was matte with soot and she leaked.Answer me Yolanda. Yolanda!

Well, you'd have to ask the driver I figure, I'm pretty stumped myself. What do you think, Dorchester?

Dorchester cleared her throat primly.We are going to extract Imler and Addicott.

Ah okay, I guess that's where we're going.Yolanda might have shattered if you hit her.Hey Dorchester, so what's the plan after that? Where's our goal?

Away from Savannah.

But where's our goal though?

The minivan sped up noticeably - the dead wheel howled.Ames will figure out on the way. If we can trust her to.

So Dorchester had a bee up her ass. Could Hollis seriously engage without drawing more attention to herself? The answer was certainly no, but she couldn't be quiet either.You can.

Good,said Dorchester.

What did it mean? Hollis pushed herself upright and climbed into the seat. They were back in the suburbs, screaming under a sky that was no less clear or blue. Houses zipped by, the rare homeless gaggle gawped, but on the whole the area was barren. Nothing familiar, probably they were in some circuitous outer reach, ripped here by Dorchester's notion of an avoidant path.

Hey,said Yolanda.Hey Dorchester. I don't see anyone.

You'll be quiet.

I think we should stop for a little and get us all some cubes. And maybe fix that wheel, that's gotta be inefficient. How about we do that. I think-

Dorchester slammed the brakes so hard she stood up in her seat. The minivan lost its momentum instantly, but its occupants were not so fortunate - Hollis flew forward, bit the back of the seat, stopped. Yolanda, having no such obstacles before her, slid straight through and sailed out the open windshield. She rolled a distance and stopped in a ragdoll spray of limbs. The minivan swayed hard on its suspension. Dorchester hung spiderlike over the steering wheel, panting.

About ten meters ahead Yolanda picked herself up. She shuffled horribly to her full height and raised her hand, Hollis thought she saw a flash and jerked back - but Yolanda just popped a thumbs up.Thaaanks!

While Yolanda helped Hollis out of her seat and around back Dorchester paced, working carnation shades into her face. No signs of violence, only hysteria. Apparently it had just been an outburst. That little quip about trust was bothersome though, seemed less and less throwaway every second. Paranoia? It had to be, Dorchester had nothing unless Kyubey had spilled, which he hadn't, probably. But in many ways paranoia was just as bad. Hollis relied on a sense of warranted neurosis to mask her true intentions - but if Dorchester wanted guilt anything could set her off. Such as flagrant vigilance, actually.

Yolanda thumped her on the back.What's up with her, do you think.

Hollis glanced. In her skidding stop Yolanda had abraded an ear to ruins, and now it hung pendulously, like a sausage link. Somehow this was more disturbing than her cratered neck - though worst of all, the grin. Self satisfied, thin-lipped, full of glowing icepick teeth. Would it ever subside?

I don't get it.Yolanda laid Hollis against the side of the minivan, hopped over to the hatchback and jerked it open.This is her fault you know.

Hollis slumped onto the lip.Yeah? Explain. Explain that to me.

Well. She wouldn't stand up for us so I had to do it for her. I guess I took it pretty far, but what was the alternative? Have some cubes.

She was offering. Hollis stared at the dark jangling cubes and sighed and took them.

I have no regrets,continued Yolanda, who had popped her Soul Gem out of seemingly nowhere and now dug in the box for more,and I'll tell you now, the only thing I hate about all this is nobody else did what I did. Not that I expect it of you, Hollis, I get your situation, I respect it, but you saw Dyson. That was pathetic. Talking all that sh*t and we get there and she starts kissing ass. They were taking us for a ride and she was letting it happen. Makes you wonder.

Hollis nodded dumbly.

But yeah, I did what I had to, and honestly I don't hate what happened at the end there at all. Those dipsh*ts needed a lesson, I'm proud to give it to them. Anyway, we made out alright, yeah? I know you're all strung out but look: all the cubes we need. And those bastards can't do a thing to stop us leaving. Not a thing.

In the maelstrom of Yolanda's bullsh*t it was hard to lock onto any single idea, but Hollis tried.How are you still alive?

Yolanda raised her eyebrows.

Hollis shook her head in despair. She shifted her Gem into egg form and pressed it to the cubes. The dismal clouds began to recede, her thoughts came a little clearer, her destroyed flesh began to reknit into a semblance of functionality. She made another attempt.Okay. They shot off your arm, your left arm, they shot it off at the elbow where your Gem is. So what's going on.

Yolanda's head lolled.Decoy obviously. Didn't you see under my bed?

Oh.Why were some like mine?

I figured you might need them.

Interesting, but it failed to fully register. In this talk about Gems something had occurred to Hollis. Thematic Magical Girl, the godawful tooth fairy. Hollis shot her a bunch and took her Gem. And then Yolanda. And then guns, panic, the escape. And…

Her extremities became glass.What about the tooth fairy.

What's that?

The Peckenpaugh girl. You took her Gem…

Cubes clinked. Yolanda's grin only briefly diminished.Well. All I can say is, I'm not a liar.

So that was bad. Maybe. Magical Girls could be callous to their own dead, they certainly were in the old days, which were only about a month and change in the past, how much could the atmosphere have changed since then? Maybe the USMF would be willing to let a single death slide. Then again, this doom didn't rely on supporting details. Like gravity and electromagnetism. No way they got out of killing a girl scot free.

Fear was the only thing that ever gave Hollis resolve. First, phone. Search:USMF Savannah.Initial result a skeleton article mentioning an 'incident' between USMF 'operatives' and 'unaffiliated Magical girls.' More details to come. Hollis scrolled but found nothing more enlightening.

Her next step was to turn meekly to Yolanda, who had claimed her fill of cubes and now crouched humming beside the husked wheel. Hollis said,Listen. We should leave soon. They're looking for us.

To which Yolanda, displaying no sign of her famous enchantment process, said,Hold on, let me work on this.

To which Hollis said,Please hurry then.

To which Yolanda said,Sure,and didn't.

That was as far as that was going, so Hollis tested her leg, shifted her popped hip, and when she thought it would hold got up and hobbled towards Dorchester. She was facing away and towards the sun, now still, arms loose at her sides. She didn't appear to notice Hollis' scuffling approach, nor when she stopped a deferential few feet behind.

Hollis cleared her throat intending to speak out loud - a thick clot of blood rose in her mouth, she spasmed, hacked it out. Telepathy was fine.Dorchester.

"Speak."

I've just learned from Yolanda,Dorchester moved not a bit but Hollis winced,sorry, Bedlowe, I've just learned from Bedlowe that she crushed that Gem. That Peckenpaugh girl. I looked it up, and they're gunning for us. I don't think they intend to let us leave, and I don't think we want to be caught, not with that girl dead.

"Okay," said Dorchester. And she inhabited her silence just as fully as before.

I think we need to hurry and leave before they find us, maybe get a new car.

"You weren't asked."

Hollis had gone too far once again. She could only muster distant interest. What would happen if she didn't bend the knee now? What if she said, for instance: "f*ck you, you stupid f*ck, you sicken me, I've hated you since the moment I knew you, I hope the USMF draw and quarter you in the street the moment we get caught you putrid bitch."

She didn't say that. She said,I apologize. What do you think we should do?

"I've already said what we'll do."

Yes.

Dorchester turned suddenly - Hollis flattened out her face, sunk an inch, assumed submissiveness. All of it too late, surely Dorchester had seen the transition. Hollis swallowed and snuck a peek and saw sunken eyes, anemic skin, a dark figure backlit. "Do you know why Bedlowe did that, Ames? You should tell me if you do."

I don't. I think it was crazy.

The voice lowered. "No, it was calculated. She had a plan. She still does. You'll tell me if you find out what it is. I can still trust you."

Of course.

Dorchester nodded. "You've been erratic lately."

Nerves. I haven't been right since we left Charleston.

Dorchester metamorphosed somehow, became softer. Her mouth curved like it was trying to smile. Hollis had no idea what to make of it and Dorchester turned quickly so it wasn't a good look, maybe nothing. "See where we can head next," said Dorchester.

Yes.Hollis suppressed a shiver and skittered away.

She returned to the hatchback. If she went idle she'd get hooked on all kinds of meaningless crap. No use in it, there were tasks. Some of the boxes had taken bullets: she emptied them out and sorted the damaged weapons from the undamaged weapons and tossed the former out. She withdrew from the heap a bushel of sharp black rifles and hobbled around and tossed them in the back seat. She accounted for several hundred grenades and scads of ammunition. Her hands were untrustworthy, didn't always go where she wanted, sometimes she paused clueless and hard of breath.

It was a necklace made of woven silver threads which glinted in light. The Gem itself was milky white. Quartz? It looked weird and drained in Yolanda's gritty spider hand.

Hollis shook her head and yanked a box deep in the mass toward her, intent on unearthing a light machine gun wedged near the bottom. Into the resultant gap bloomed a fluffy white tail - it flicked and receded into the crevice from which it originated. Hollis slid the box back into place, occupied herself with another, began to pick through its contents. She swallowed and did not look over her shoulder.

Miss Ames?

Shut up. You could have stopped it. You could have warned me.

I didn't see it coming any more than you did. Please try to focus on the issue at hand - you need to come up with a way to handle your situation.

Hollis shuffled through the same five pistol magazines over and over.You watched and didn't intervene and now we're here.

What purpose would it serve? I can't help those who won't engage logically. Unfortunately, the USMF can be just as confounding as any Magical Girl collective.Boxes shifted, a flutter of white breezed through a crack in the box wall, a red eye gazed.You should examine your own actions, Miss Ames, before you criticize mine. Arguably this entire situation could have been avoided if you were willing to openly challenge Miss Bedlowe.

Hollis smouldered.

Anyway, you appear to be emotionally compromised at the moment. I had intended to help you with your predicament, but perhaps my time is better spent elsewhere. Should I go?

Screw it, what the hell.Go on, you f*cker. Get out of here.

Very well.And the eye vanished.

Hollis made space, withdrew the machine gun, no Kyubey. She heaved it atop the hill of AR-15s and returned to the back. She shifted boxes until she found the one with the gems. None of them looked real, they were dyed plastic, slippery, shiny. She wouldn't have been convinced, and she couldn't see anyone else falling for it either. She picked up a sapphire, hovered it next to the real article, balked at the difference even more. It would never work.

She looked over her shoulder. Yolanda was there, still tinkering with the wheel. Dorchester stood exactly as she'd been left.

In a sudden clumsy rush she popped out her Gem, slid it into her robes, and put the fake in its place. The chintzy faceted surface clacked like plastic, but the enchantment took hold at once and it stuck fast. Hollis leaned forward into the storage compartment and stuffed the other one into her bag. She bit back heavy breaths. She closed her eyes.

Kyubey.

Yes, Miss Ames?

What do I do?

I would recommend you disengage as soon as possible. There's no need to heed our previous discussions to that effect, as those arrangements have been dissolved: therefore, take whatever opportunity presents itself. You may wish to escape while outside the city limits, since I can't guarantee preferential treatment if you are captured by the USMF.

Hollis nodded.They'll kill me. Retribution.

It's unlikely they'd do so intentionally. However, there's no reason to put yourself at risk. In that vein, you should of course avoid direct conflict with either Miss Malecki or Miss Bedlowe, since you have no chance of beating them in open combat. It would be best if you could flee while they were somehow distracted.

How vague. Hollis stared at the middle distance and thought.I could slip away on the road maybe.

I will leave that up to you.

Hollis suddenly focused.How likely is it that I survive.

I doubt you would find that information useful enough to warrant its disclosure.

Oops.So it's hopeless.

Not at all. I don't deal in hopeless outcomes - statistically, this is still a valuable enough situation to warrant my attention. However, your tendency towards pessimism would likely cause you to interpret reasonable odds as impossible, therefore diminishing your ability to function in this critical hour.

Hollis snorted.Okay. Thanks for looking out for me Kyubey.

You're welcome. In any case, I believe I've said everything I needed to. I have other matters to attend to, so if you don't mind I'll take my leave.

Yeah. Bye.

Hollis sat among the boxes. Yolanda was now physically cranking the wheel. She grinned at Hollis as the bearing shrieked like a dying creature.

'Other matters'. Where could that body of his be going? Plying the old con? Or even better - a chat with the USMF, maybe those very girls now hunting Hollis. He could be working out some deal that blew her piddly percentile right out the water. And nothing to do about it either. Funnily, Hollis had picked up a notion somewhere, maybe from all the speeches, that Kyubey would be relegated to an advisory role in the new way of things. But nothing could stop Kyubey from getting up to sh*t. All that happened was a rebrand and some added complexity, so you couldn't understand.

Hollis' throat convulsed against her will, a crackling bark produced itself. Dorchester turned and gave her a cragged stare.

Hollis didn't look away. She couldn't have told why. Dorchester broke gaze and old man shuffled to a further vantage point. And Hollis trembled in the heat, and she retreated past Yolanda, and she waited ten minutes in the back seat before they followed her in and left.

She decided to call ahead. Her intent was that it would be a calming influence, maybe some validation for Dorchester and some fun for Yolanda - and occupation for Hollis herself, who knew no other way to stop biting her nails. Ideally the response from Imler would be confused and irate, making her an adequate punching bag even considering Hollis' preternatural impotence. But when she made the call, the response she received was:

"f*ck you. I know what you crazy motherf*ckers did. You aren't getting me killed, so you just come and try. You'll get what's coming to you."

"What? Hold on," yelled Hollis. By now her throat and mouth had reconstituted enough that she could speak with great care and enunciation. Imler plowed on before she could finish.

"I always knew you three were batsh*t. Never should have associated with you, that was my sh*ttiest move, but today I'm rectifying it. Say bye to your f*cking 'vassal,' you uptight conceited bitchass. Next time I see you the USMF will have your crowd on f*cking poles."

"Listen to me," said Hollis, meaninglessly, because Imler had already hung up. Hollis called again, it immediately declined. The phone flopped between her feet as she leaned back in the seat and closed her eyes and breathed, onetwo, threefour, quick and fast.

Yolanda said something garbled by the gale force winds.How'd it go?

Hollis' breathing exercise was instantly ruined. In the windows were scorched houses and trashy streets she recognized. They couldn't be but ten minutes away.

What did she say?Dorchester wanted to know.

Why had Hollis called? If she hadn't called Imler would have said nothing, and then there would be no cause for fear or bad news to report. The thought of such an innocent and privileged state was actually tear inducing. She buried her head in her hands and miserably gave up the information.She says she's not coming.

Tell her we'll come in and drag her out if she wants.

Hollis could do nothing else. She dug up the phone and called Imler once more. The dial tone ran, the phone clicked, Imler answered. "BITCH," she said, and then hung up. Hollis held the phone in her lap and stared at its pink lace glitter hell display. The light burned her eyeballs.

What now,said Dorchester.

Hollis shrugged.

Then we'll just go in and get her.

Okay,said Hollis, because what else was left?

She attempted to return to blissful ignorance and was thwarted by Yolanda, who had been revitalized.I've always wanted to give that girl Imler what she deserves,she crooned toothily,Snooty bitch that she is. What about we drag her behind the car while we drive.

We'll do what we need to,said Dorchester.

I think we need to drag her. Hey Hollis,tapping Hollis on the shoulder,Go on and get out some rope, how about it?

Hollis refused. If she didn't cooperate they could only do so much. The creep could be slowed.

God I hate that f*cker,continued Yolanda, having never stopped,We don't even need her, right? Let's just string her up a pole and let the USMF have her.

She mentioned poles,said Hollis for no reason at all.

Oh?

Yes. She said we'd be on them. On poles.

Is that what she said?Yolanda snapped, she nodded resolutely.Bitch. I bet she thinks she's hot sh*t. That's okay, we can show her.

Really, it was better if Hollis had no brain to compose thoughts. She could break it if only she could find a suitable blunt object.

Look,tapped Yolanda a few minutes later,There we go. I can't wait for this sh*t.

Hollis looked. Imler's house, half a block away, came fast. It was like every other building for miles, squat and dim - save for the windows, which were stuffed with iridescent white fiber. Cotton balls, Imler's dumb power. Some had tumbled onto the murky grass, where they breezed about like tumbleweeds. Around the house hummed a loose crowd.

Hollis felt sickness on her tongue. Before the USMF butted into Charleston she had been getting visitors on the regular. They wanted to shake her hand on the street - they tried to catch her on video - they got her phone number and filled her messages with bullsh*t. Two months in she pledged to never again interact with regular people, and with some work didn't.

But they had followed, somehow: maybe magnetism. They were infatuated already with eccentric rogues, Dallas pilgrims, dubious alliances - and now a genuine outlaw situation? It would start again but worse: they were going to see everything, and even the most destitute had to have phones. No escaping it, the world was right here waiting. Hollis clutched a rifle near. Her arm had solidified enough she thought she could use it.

The crowd on the street opened up and the minivan entered, faces and bodies ablur in the windows like sh*ttier wraiths. Dorchester didn't even slow fractionally until they were right at the house at which point she slammed on brakes and stopped them instantly. Nobody went flying out the windshield this time, but Hollis smashed her nose on the passenger seat. Dorchester and Yolanda piled out, Hollis sat stunned. Yolanda dipped back in. "Come on man, let's goooo!"

Hollis stumbled out of the car on her half healed legs and winced and raised her rifle at an incline - people everywhere, ten times more than when she was inside, the closest was right across the street. She pointed her rifle. "Back up!"

The guy scramble-shuffled away, but Hollis couldn't let her rifle down, every time she looked in the corner of her eyes she saw someone padding closer, the thought of them all around her, closing in, she felt herself uncontrollably losing it. "Calm down, girl," said someone in the crowd.

Hollis swallowed. "You just stay back. We're here on something official, so all of you need to get out of here. Get gone." When nobody got gone she gestured the muzzle sharply. "Go! Get out!"

Yolanda strolled next to her from nowhere, another rifle slung casually from her arm. "Hey guys, it's dangerous here soon. Back off, yeah?"

They listened to Yolanda - they slid away, settled alongside houses, watched from a distance. A few headed from the scene altogether. Hollis struggled to lower her rifle. She glanced at Yolanda, hunted for any sign of secret homicide in her expression, but Yolanda just looked satisfied. Could it be that Hollis had fallen below even this maniac? Too harsh a thought to consider.

A hand touched her shoulder and she turned haltingly around. Dorchester's ashen face was motionless.Ames, talk with Imler. Tell her I'm giving her one more chance, and then we're leveling the house.

Hollis' body crumpled.Why?

Dorchester scowled. She grabbed Hollis by the arm, leveraged her down the concrete walkway, and left her in front of the door.Do it.

Hollis wanted to pace but everyone was watching so she just rocked her heels, stared at the limp rifle in her hands, rocked. She spat a curse, she chunked the rifle precariously against her shoulder, she hated Imler's voice in her head so she dug around in her bag for another f*cking phone. She called and it picked up. "You don't know what's good for you, little f*ckers. I see all you rats hanging out down there. Try to get in, go on, do it."

"If you don't come out of there," said Hollis, quavering, "Then we'll blow up your f*cking house."

"Sure, motherf*cker! Have fun with the rest of your time! Because in ummm, twenty minutes? I guarantee you, I'll be the one having the f*cking fun. I'll watch them crucify you from my window. I bet you won't last a second, you least of all, ineffectual bootlicker bitch-"

Hollis twitched. "f*ck you," she choked.

"What, what did I say? That's right, you're trash! I knew the moment I saw you, I snapped my fingers, tamed bitch. Am I wrong? AM I WRONG?" She laughed and laughed.

Hollis reeled and dashed the phone to glinting pieces against the sidewalk but Imler was still laughing in her head, so she paced openly to the tune onetwothreefour, and at fivesixshe whipped around and put five shots into the door. Five neat holes opened up, casings tinkled luminously, but Imler kept going.Put a f*cking leash on you! All that sh*t you pulled in Charleston, acting like a cool f*cker, big dick extraordinaire - but look at you cringe!

Shooting the door had been unsatisfying, so Hollis charged it. Her elbow cracked through the panel wood, half her arm burrowed. She pulled back with the vague intent of a redoubled assault, and the weak plywood that had captured her buckled obligingly - but her arm stuck and rebounded short of freedom. A sandpaper rustle, insistent and irate, rose from the bullet holes. Her heart plunged as a fat knot solidified around her arm and ripped her in up to the shoulder. As she scrabbled for footing the fist clenched, and Hollis' arm returned to tender meat and gravel. The pain was fantastic, minimally dampened, bone grinding around the goo marrow. She strained and contorted but the flesh wouldn't give. Another pull, she thunked into the door, it rattled on its hinges, she panted and subsided. For long seconds she hung attached, until a sharp twist and a wet tear detached the arm a few inches below the shoulder joint.

Hollis stumbled away. Her arm tapered into a dripping shaggy ruin, flesh and cloth intermingled and unsure. She moved to touch but the operation came to halt as the rifle, still flaccid in her sweat-clumsy hand, clacked into her stump. Hideous.

Come on back,said Dorchester.

Hollis shuffled off stage. She was a pale creature in rags - she wasn't even humiliated. Pious acceptance motivated her. She slunk past Dorchester and Yolanda and slouched against the side of the minivan. She did not listen to Imler, now gagging on mirth.

"Well," proclaimed Yolanda, "let's go in and kill her."

"Hold on," said Dorchester, and then, by telepathy,Ames, what did she say.

She said no.

What else.

What else? Hollis sighed under the crushing workload of this question.She suggested that some people are on the way. Probably the USMF, I don't know.

Did she say USMF?

No. I don't know.Hollis raised her arm in a disabled shrug, her rifle swung wide, Dorchester didn't flinch.She wasn't clear, maybe she has some buddies. That's a consideration. But it's probably the USMF. I guess they're all headed here right now.

Dorchester nodded. She looked inscrutably at the house.

"Hey guys, speak out loud, would you?" Yolanda jerked her head to some unknown point in the perimeter of witnesses. "They should hear this - they should know we haven't lost our guts."

"We're leaving," said Dorchester.

"What's that," said Yolanda.

"Get in the car."

"Oh my god," laughed Yolanda, "we'releaving.We have her surrounded, what the hell are you talking about, leaving. I'm not leaving."

"You are. I'm telling you."

Yolanda scoffed, she looked around grinning as if awaiting applause. "No. You leave. I'm teaching this girl how to act. This is some long overdue education, it is my moral duty to make up where you fell short, which I think we can all agree this is your fault, if you had some spine you'd have nipped this bitch in the bud five minutes after we got to Savannah. But you didn't. Well, I'll fix it, and I'll do it on my own, but I'm doing it. You can't take that from me."

The viewers were becoming interested. Brave scouts slipped along the houses, whipped out phones and pinched their screens for high definition shots. Hollis watched in removed befuddlement as one floated her way. Neither Yolanda nor Dorchester seemed to notice.

Imler chortled.You just wait!

"I will not brook disobedience," said Dorchester.

Yolanda snorted. "How can you say that? You've brooked it, motherf*cker. What I've seen out of you is some weak sh*t. It makes me wonder: where the hell are your balls? Did they shrivel in front of the f*cking television?"

The guy approaching Hollis was fat and conspicuous, flaming green golf shirt overflowing his belt, khakis. He thumbed his phone ceaselessly, tilting and shifting for a better view.

"Back off," she said. She swayed against the minivan, eyelids drooping. When they reopened he was five steps closer. Teleportation. Hollis twitched. "Hey."

He stopped and rubbed his neck with his free hand. "I don't mean nothing."

"Just stay back."

"If you know what's good for you you'll stop pushing this," said Dorchester. "I've restrained myself. I can stop. You don't want that."

"I want it. Make me your bitch. Come on."

"I will." Dorchester flicked her hand in a theatric burst of sparks and smoke, from which emerged her ancient scroll. Somehow her image worsened - she became a bony kid, clinging to her prop as the world loomed over her. Yolanda laughed violently.

"Are they gonna fight," said the man.

Hollis formulated a response. "They might. Get out of here. It's dangerous."

The man nodded. He said something else, but Hollis couldn't understand it because suddenly Imler's sh*t was in her head.Holliiiiis! You're gonna dieeee, motherf*cker!

Hollis squinted. "What?"

"Are you USMF or what?"

"I-independent."

"Well do it!" shouted Yolanda. "Do it if you've got the f*cking balls, and if not, we know who you really are! How about that? Is that fair?"

Dorchester took a thin breath. "Shut the f*ck up, senseless bitch. Time and time again you question my orders - time and time again you flagrantly disobey. Fine. I will show you." She stepped back and squared up.

Ohooh, look out! Any minute now!

"Words are cool, but I bet your puss*fied ass won't do a damn thing."

"One more chance." The scroll flapped and rippled.

"No more chance. Give me what I want."

Nothing was real. The world was a caricature of itself, Savannah a rotten parody of Charleston. Hollis hadn't had time to realize the disintegration before. How could anything continue?

She had to make an attempt. Even if it did nothing.Let's leave.

Dorchester flicked her scroll. A cone of spectral light flashed from the cracking edge and bowled Yolanda directly in the chest. Yolanda flew back, skidded, dug her hands into the asphalt and gained traction and leapt up and to the side just in time to be torn off her feet by another blast which sent her spinning as Dorchester queued up the next.

At the last moment Yolanda got her feet and ducked the wave with a simian lunge. It whumped into Imler's front door and shoved in the entire front section of the house, and immediately most of the upper floor slumped into the gap as disparate bits of particle board and plastic siding. A telepathic shriek:My HOUSE you f*cking PATHETIC psycho BITCHES.

Yolanda's grin looked threadbare. Knives glared limp in her hands.Hey Hollis, tell Dyson to stop.

Right. Before it was too late. If Hollis wanted to get out of this everything had to cohere, so she had to act.

But it happened so fast anyway. Dorchester launched into a run, headed insanely for none other than Hollis, she jumped midway and and hit the side of the minivan inches from Hollis' cringing head and banked herself into a stiff flight toward Yolanda. Through her shadowed fingers Hollis saw the fantastic beauty of the scene, the insane arc, the fluttering glory...

Dorchester plunged. Yolanda finally flicked out a knife that snagged her sleeve but didn't stick. In the fraction of a second before she hit the ground Dorchester whipped her scroll and the air pulsed and bursting forth came a wave two, three, four times the size of the previous attacks - it flattened Yolanda, it crushed the asphalt around her in a great crack-thump, dust spouted, and there was silence.

The thin shroud of grime didn't conceal. A figure kneeled atop a lumpy mass. Dorchester appeared to be choking Yolanda, who was nonresponsive. Could she be dead? But the notion was false - her arm raised and tugged at Dorchester's costume, a begging child. Dorchester bore down harder, her face flatly arid. "Listen to me Bedlowe. Listen to me."

Yolanda kicked weakly.

"You need to understand. I think you're a very privileged person, actually. You don't seem to think about death a whole lot. But think about it now. It's important." She shifted, she raised one hand as the other clenched. A ruby glinted brightly, untainted by dust. "The way you'll die, Bedlowe, you're gone. Okay? I'm not saying this particular part of your life is over. I'm saying you disappear. I'm saying you're erased."

Yolanda's pulped head turned and twitched. Puffy lids opened on Dorchester.Get her off of me Hollis. Tell her that's enough.

Hollis turned away, away.

"If you won't cooperate," said Dorchester. "That's it. I know you don't want to die in Savannah, but that's how it will have to be. Do you understand? I'm trying to be very level with you."

Yolanda had to be looking, Hollis was sure of it - but when she eked out a glimpse the eyes were stuck on Dorchester. Talking surely but no way to know, both their faces were greyed in psychopathic nil. Some vibration rose to a resonant frequency, Dorchester closed her eyes and jerked, and with a cartilage pop Yolanda's neck was suddenly longer. Hollis' skin curled.

Unraveling. It could take any form from here. She couldn't trust her instincts, they hadn't gotten her anywhere for years, since the predictable had begun its irreversible degradation. Warm simplicity turning to sharp bright infinity, irreversible, hideously chronic. Had to be Savannah, as a location, as an idea. Some innate quality that broke the mind. Why else did she remain, except that it had already touched her, corrupting…

S-something behind her.

Hollis whipped around. The f*cking GUY, inches away and two times her size, right there, why, WHY.

"Woah," said the fat man. He dropped the phone and raised his hands. "Hey. I'm cool."

She hurried backwards, the rifle bobbing by her string arm. She was never more of an adolescent than when her voice broke. "Get back!"

The back of her foot snagged on something. She stumbled, she twisted, she had no arm with which to balance. As she fell he ballooned even larger. No good being below a man so large. In her flailing her arm had come to align perfectly and she fired and-

Hit the ground.

The man stumbled back, throat bobbing. Seeing that Hollis was looking at him he turned to break fully. His stride broke and he floundered to the ground. The slimmest puncture dotted his upper thigh, it might have been a button hole.

Hollis scrambled to her feet. "Now you f*cking regret it!"

The man groaned. He weakly sat up, he pressed his skinned palms to the wound. Blood thickened down his pants leg.

Oh sh*t,said Imler.

Others had to have seen. Hollis craned for views around houses - she hustled around the minivan, fully prepared to intercept a martyr, her heart thumped in her eyes and she raised her rifle but discovered no one, no one at all. She circled back around.Dorchester.

Hold on.

The man was breathing hard and his face was wet. "Help," he said. He tried to push himself upright but slipped and fell back panting. Candy red slipped around his hand in calm runnels and spillages. The slickness kept him from applying proper pressure, he slid and flopped.

"Why the hell were you so close?" raved Hollis suddenly. She gesticulated with the rifle to make her point. "Of course you'd get shot! What the f*ck!"

The man wheezed and tried again to get up. His face was pale and his head fell back slowly, by degrees. "I need an ambulance. You hit some arteries or something. Awh god," he groaned, "Why'd you have to go and do that."

"Shut up, you know why, you can't say that sh*t. This is your fault." Hollis' mouth was dry, she paced and paced. "You'll be fine anyway. You've got some girls headed here, they'll do whatever the f*ck, I don't have time, I'm f*cking sorry if that's what you want to hear." She looked over her shoulder, down the road's lifeless graveside bulge. No sirens she could hear.Dorchester what are you doing we need to go.

Yes.Motionless.

Dorchester they're going to kill us all if we get caught, do you understand that, they'll execute Yolanda for the girl and you for not stopping it and I've just shot a guy in the leg, he's bleeding and I think I hit something bad, and you need to remember, Dorchester, that I'm your goddamn subordinate and whatever they do to me they'll do to you, so I'd advise you to get your ass into gear if you want to survive this, which I do want to Dorchester, I really really do.

Dorchester kneed up and looked. She was inanimate again, her eyes chafed to a standstill in their stone sockets.Okay,she said, and she bent over and grabbed limp Yolanda by the scarf and hauled her out of the crater.

Hollis would probably never feel relief again. She slipped dismally toward the minivan. A husky sigh exploded behind her. "Ma'am," said the man. Mucus popped in his throat.

She dropped the rifle and rustled around in her bag. "Hold on," she spat, "Just hold on."

"Stick by me. I can't think straight." He paused. "Listen, just, just call. Just do the call."

"Jesus shut up. Motherf*cker." Hollis ripped a phone out of her bag and deposited it on his heaving chest. "Use that, call whoever. I'm gone."

"No," moaned the man, and he shook his head and screwed his eyes shut.

Hollis stepped away. Dorchester and Yolanda were in the minivan. Ryatt next, Ryatt had to go better. No point in this. She looked back only as she entered the death-touched silence of the minivan. The man was fumbling with her phone, it was slipping in his fingers, the gore drenched everything.

She got in next to Yolanda's sallow cadaver and slammed the door. As they pulled away Imler slid down the wreckage of the house in a torrent of cotton balls, skidding to the center of the street. She watched them go.

Hollis didn't make much note of anything on the drive to Ryatt's house, save one incident. They were within a few miles of their destination, in a sector where the houses were burned skeletons and wraiths slid around in every miasma choked crevice. You could hear their gregarious chatter over the wind if you listened, which Hollis did. The sticky rise and fall suggested words, phrases, thoughts.

Hollis watched the scenery zip by, but Yolanda turned to see it vanish. Her destroyed body couldn't have been held together by much more than magic, and yet, seemingly immune to protective unconsciousness, she continued to stress the bounds of her physicality, twisting at a spine snapping angle to peer through the back window.

Hey Hollis. Look.

Hollis was in no mood for resistance. She looked. What she saw took a moment to register. On the horizon, a swirling vagueness, a dark blot that widened and climbed the sky, trailing smudged curtains to the unknowable ground. Its dim weight drifted in fractions, not so much approaching as expanding.

Yolanda's quagmire face twisted interestingly.Is that a storm?

It was.

Chapter 3: Cavatina in G Major

Chapter Text

The air took on clagginess - the clouds hummed closer, accelerating and blooming into a supercell discus from which a flat plane of fuzzy mold unfurled over the earth. Electric fingers blinked as though levitating the mass, gifting the winds that buffeted the sides of the minivan ionic charge. When they rocketed onto Ryatt's street the carpet had expanded above them, and a patter of limp drizzle was invading through the open windows. The storm's thick center loomed, a cyclonic bulkhead revolving pendulously, casting mammoth shadows.

Not a miasma, no, it didn't feel like that. Storm girl then. Thematically it fit nobody else. Supercharged, given de-facto command, bolstered by unknown power synergies. No telling how bad it would get.

In a blazing display of restraint Dorchester slowed when Ryatt's diminished, colorless hovel appeared, and stopped quietly in front of it. Hollis got out and humped over the drained lawn. Ryatt was already outside, inconspicuous and pitiful - a small, short girl with a shoved in face and friar getup that amounted to an artfully cut potato sack. She huddled near the door among suitcases and plastic bags stuffed with clothes. She appeared to be trying to turn the lock.

"That's not going to fit," called Hollis on her approach.

Ryatt jerked, she swiveled from the door dragging a bulbous wooden staff that was barely enough counterweight to keep her upright. Her gelatin eyes didn't focus. "Oh hey Hollis," She turned twitchily to fiddle with the lock again. "Just a second."

Hollis came up behind and watched for a spell. An urge rose. "Why lock the door if you're not coming back?"

Ryatt physically cringed. "I just want to."

"Seriously, don't bother. Let the wraiths have it." This yielded no response. Potential tingled in Hollis' fingers. "Hey, Ryatt?"

"Yes."

"How about that car? What happened to that? I don't see a car."

"I, uh. I had someone take it. Take care of it." Butterfingers, the key rang on the concrete step, Ryatt scrambled for it.

"Got it," crowed Hollis. "Someone, that's so neat. Everyone can use someone."

Ryatt fumbled, red faced.

Hollis,said Dorchester,We can't waste time.

It wasn't as though Dorchester would understand. For her purposes Ryatt was less than human, any interaction with such a mote of dust had to be efficient, no room for entertainment or appreciable tactics. But in this case, sure - they didn't have time. Hollis stepped forward, raising her arm. "Okay Ryatt."

Ryatt winced and abandoned the key. "Yes. Sorry. One second." She bent towards her bagged possessions.

"No." Hollis pushed her by the shoulder.

With perfect timidity Ryatt gave way, slid from the bags, stooped half-grinning at Hollis like a cornered dog. "Why?"

"No room. You can get more in Texas."

"Texas," whispered Ryatt.

"Yeah, Texas, get with the program." She heaped a friendly hand onto Ryatt's back and dragged her towards the minivan. It began to rain harder. A thickening cloud cover consumed the sky in mute negatives, while the dark locus of the storm swelled into panorama above what must have been the entire city. Hollis searched hopelessly for a sliver of blue. In how many minutes had this happened?

The mutilated corpse in the backseat leaned over as Ryatt neared. From the soft wet mouth hole rose a death-rattle wheeze. Ryatt went instantly stiff.

"Get in," said Hollis. Raindrops ponged on the minivan and wet her cheeks. She was becoming a beleaguered hunchback.

Ryatt shook her head feebly.

"Come on."

"Please."

But Hollis prodded her inside. She wrung her hands hard as Hollis slammed the door shut. Hollis assumed the passenger seat and the moment she was in they were off, shooting through the rain, which instantly turned into a hail of small bullets that crashed into Hollis mercilessly. She waved her hands and spluttered, but Dorchester just kept going.

She finally hauled a poofy pink umbrella out of her bag to shield from the worst of it, which frilly girth obscured much of the flight from Savannah. If Hollis didn't have so many bits and pieces of this cursed sprawl burned into her cortex she might have tried to sneak a look.

Adieuto: bungalows and bungled dreams, fat and jolly wraiths in convenient abundance, a long slow misery in central hell. The backroads were known to have more efficiency.

It became clear that Dorchester had only a loose idea of their destination. She ripped around sharp corners, making turns whenever the opportunity came, quick and squiggly like a lunatic fieldmouse. The roads became mud ruts and, increasingly, dead ends.

Hollis suffered to produce another phone and guide them. She assumed an invalid crouch with the umbrella clamped between her knees, white-knuckling the phone so it wouldn't slip despite moisture that appeared to seep directly from her pores, left to endure as the GPS voiceover supplied a procession of hairpin turns that slammed her into her surroundings repeatedly. She found it increasingly difficult to shake the conviction that they were going down the same five holes in alternating circulations of some new eternity. Slick black treeforms whipped and gabbed on all sides.

Visible in the droplet-dotted rearview mirror, Yolanda corpulently sprawled, her broken face turned up in an idiot grin, her crooked roadkill arms unfurled over the seats. She issued forth a ghoulish moan of shocking volume, rolling her head on a lubricated socket to rest, bowed, towards Ryatt. Ryatt shrunk into her clothing by a full size.

Undoubtedly Yolanda augmented her strange behavior with all manner of telepathic insults and threats. See how Ryatt freezes without readily apparent cause, flits her terrified gaze across the car, shifts and huddles. Put that kind of pressure on the kid and she'd break pretty soon.

But. This rancid situation could be a chance. In fact, weren't they now at Hollis' mercy? The GPS guided them, and Hollis' magic guided the GPS. Leverage. And they were outside the city, good idea Kyubey! Supposing Yolanda didn't just put a knife in her back she'd be able to vanish in seconds, cloaked in trees and storm.

It didn't seem that important, actually. Where to go from there? Texas? sh*t.

Yolanda bapped the seat.So hey Hollis what was that about, that guy? Is he dead?

I don't know.

He sure was bleeding a lot.She gurgle-growled at Ryatt.I don't think he's got luck on his side, I'll tell you that.

Hollis was decaying.Cut that out with Ryatt.

Yolanda stopped growling but otherwise didn't cut it out. She hovered over Ryatt ominously.

I'm telling you stop.

What's with the hardass routine, Hollis? We all need stress relief. You too. You're wound up, I can tell. You should just let loose for a little while, while we've got the chance.

I need to be able to focus if we're going to survive. Do you want to survive?

Cooling off is a good thing, Hollis. I get it, we've been through some sh*t, it's totally cool. I'll even hop up there and you can have Ryatt to yourself, how about that?

Hollis was inspired to give up.Okay, Yolanda, do what you want.

Yolanda blinked piggishly in the mirror. She slid away from Ryatt.I don't know what your deal is, Hollis.

I'm tired.

Well it's just weird, I guess. You've been off since this morning. If there was something going on you'd tell me, right?

Sure,said Hollis.

Well I hope.

They found roads. They slipped into increasingly large vessels, all of which were empty. An outer townlet brushed by and though Hollis peered obsessively at the brown/white/grey boxes that made up its mass she couldn't spot a single indication of life. As though the world itself had become hollow. Like a miasma, come to think. Add a few wraiths and Hollis was ready to believe.

Ryatt began to hyperventilate. Yolanda made increasingly humorous gestures at her. As they passed over some tarry marshland Ryatt sank shivering into the door, and, glaring furtively, made a series of gestures centered around her palm - where sprouted in fast-motion a small grey mushroom. She tugged it off her skin and popped it in her mouth and went ramrod, eyes closed, fists balled, chewing minutely.

I can't believe you expect me to not acknowledge this,said Yolanda.

Hollis sighed unheard in the rain.

sh*t, Hollis, I mean this just clarifies, this is mushroom girl we're talking about. She makes FUNGUS.

I said do what you want, Yolanda. Do what you want. Throw her out of the f*cking car for what I care. Get it out of your system.

Yolanda issued a pneumonic snort.Don't give me that. I'm not irrational like you think I am. I've got a good hold on myself, okay?

Incredible.

Hollis?

Okay,said Hollis,you're in control, you've got it handled. Got it.

No, I do. I guess I seem crazy, and that's just how it is, but you've gotta have faith in me here. What I do, is for a reason. And I'm there for you, alright?

Hollis snickered. What the hell?

Anyway you don't have to worry about me getting rid of Ryatt here, she'd have to get through me if she wanted to leave, ain't that right?She elbowed Ryatt. Ryatt lolled and cracked her eyes and blinked in dull shock.

Ain't that right,poked Yolanda.

Ryatt's eyes glistened. She buried her head in her hands.I'm sorry.

Yolanda cackled happily.Don't be sorry, answer! Godshe must be high as hell. Look I don't mean to bother you, I just want you to think, that's all. You're not gonna get a better chance than this.

Which was true. Hollis eyed the mirror. Ryatt was drifting sedately down her seat. Hollis wrung her fingers.Ryatt you mentioned that someone had your car?

My friend,mumbled Ryatt.

What's this friend. Tell me about your friend.

He's just my friend. He took my car and he's got it for me later. He can bring it up wherever.

I don't care about the car Ryatt, tell me about this guy, this friend. What's he like.

He's just. He helps me figure bad stuff out, and he's my friend, okay?

Cool, and what does he look like?

Ryatt stared miserably at the floorboard.He's got long hair,she said.

Okay, great,nodded Hollis.Well so you're aware I shot a guy earlier today that looked like that. I think he bled out.

Ryatt receded into her fingers.

Make of that what you will.

No,said Ryatt, and she pressed the heels of her hands into her eyes and curled up there around her staff.

Yolanda draped an arm over Ryatt's dull shoulders.Aw don't be sensitive, it can't be that bad.She winked in the mirror as Ryatt leaned away.

Hollis stared into the rain. Drops and drips ran out of her laden hair and down her forehead and into her eyes. She twisted in her seat and pushed awkwardly into the back space to directly view Ryatt's wretched twitching form. What was f*cking wrong with her?Ryatt, listen.

Why? Why did you do that?

No, listen, I was lying. I never shot someone like that. It was a joke.

Ryatt was motionless.

How would I even do something like that anyway, if he was doing whatever with your car today. We never had the chance to cross paths. What, do you just take whatever I say at face value? Jesus, exercise some critical thought.

Why,croaked Ryatt.

Why what? How about because you need to learn, Ryatt? You need to learn to act and think like a Magical Girl, but you keep being a whiny kid f*cker instead. Look at you right now, while all us real Magical Girls are busting our asses and trying to survive. I've never in my life seen a worse excuse for a Magical Girl, and you never improve, you never get it together even a little bit. You'd be dead without us. It's pathetic. If you want-

Get back up here,said Dorchester.

If you want to live you need to get your sh*t together, the world's moving on without you, and you need to know that, and you need to act on it, so how about that, for a reason, Ryatt.

Ames if you don't obey me there will be consequences. I need you to get up here and change our course.

Hollis returned to her seat.Why?

Dorchester's slate eyes remained ahead. Her fingers were stone on the wheel.We are being followed.

Hollis quietly eyed the mirror. Indeed, in the far distance, almost beyond sight on this wavy bounding road, a car hovered, white with blue markings. In intermittent dapples of dull neptunian light it was possible to make out POLICE along its silverfish sides.

We need to outrun them. Do your job.

Hollis did her job - it only took a thought. The GPS redirected to plow into more horrible side roads beginning about a mile away. Dorchester sped up, the police car did not close in or recede. Yolanda contorted.Is that the cops?

Yes,said Hollis.

And I guess we're running away.

Yes.

Okay,said Yolanda.One second.

No time to comprehend. True to her word, Yolanda took about one second to rise casually from desolation and throw herself through the missing door hole. Thump went the back tire. Yolanda appeared again behind the minivan, standing up already, and the wet thrumming oppression did not significantly cut the glint of her knife. The police car braked and swerved onto the centerline, but Yolanda was long airborn at that point, in the closing of a parabola into the cruiser's windshield. The glass caved, Yolanda disappeared, the steering went wild. It slid off of the road and vanished into trees with a misty crunch, two gunshots, and nothing else.

Hollis was unable to look away from the mirror for any length of time, but Dorchester didn't appear to have noticed. She continued at great speed for the remainder of the road and turned off at the phone's cue and they were again inside the grasping bowels. Swells of wind crashed through the treetops.

We're leaving her behind?asked Hollis.

Yes,said Dorchester.

And they did.

Yolanda claimed by the hellworld. What did it mean? It meant they could be claimed.

Face it, the situation had changed. It was all barriers now, how many things between Hollis and death. With one obstacle subtracted it would seep faster than ever. When Yolanda died the enchantment on the minivan would go and leave them in these stygian depths. Before then she would certainly kill more Magical Girls, making the reprisal even worse.

And the storm grew. Or descended? It was definitely getting thicker, but it seemed also to deepen, draping in seething increments - but the impenetrable dark this very cloudcover fostered made any judgment meaningless, and the rain pelted so even in a flash of lightning nothing could be discerned. Hollis was busy anyway with the umbrella and phone and shivering Ryatt in back who needed to be observed at every opportunity to confirm she hadn't dropped into the tempest.

Dorchester refused to turn on her headlights. They ran off the side of the road and bump-bumped back onto pavement just as the sucking mud was about to set them spinning, only to drift over the unmarked centerline and repeat the process on the other side. Ryatt slid all over the back seat and was unable to avoid coming into contact with the black residue streaking Yolanda's seat. Hollis could no longer stand it.Turn the f*cking headlights on.

No.

Why? Masochism? I don't care, I don't want to crash, don't be an idiot.

Dorchester had become a porous shade. She flicked on the headlights. Whatever the backwash revealed Hollis didn't see. Ahead the twin headlight cones had opened up once more the sh*t country, now wet and hungry. At their uppermost points the cones brushed right up against a layer of cloud.

Oh f*ck you,said Hollis.

It wasn't going away. It sharply delineated from the air like a textbook illustration, Nimbostratus (Ns). And lowering? When Hollis blinked it looked awfully like it was.

Get ready to fight,said Dorchester.

Why, why Hollis? She had no utility, couldn't she focus on surviving? Just leave her alone forever, let her be penitent in peace and self flagellate with impunity instead of, IMPOSING it-

With a snap-crack, a purple buzzling flash, a bulge began to drop from the clouds ahead. It pulsed and engorged pregnantly, it hung down down down. Dorchester jammed in the pedal they soared towards the bulge and from its depths burgeoned a very familiar ultraviolet comet crackling and burning up the road. Dorchester ripped the minivan to the side and it skidded, twirled, tilted as though about to flip, and miraculously stopped halfway off the road as the comet detonated somewhere and sent a prickly jolt through the forest and slapped Hollis around some more. Dorchester dipped out - Hollis fell through the door, drunk and shocked and clutching her crushed umbrella, in time to see her step onto the road and assume a cool stance and flourish her scroll into existence. Ember motes snapped off the edges and died in darkness.

"Stay in the car Ryatt," mumbled Hollis. She cowered near the hood. Better believe Hollis wasn't doing anything. If Dorchester wanted her in there she'd have to f*cking drag her.

The bulge touched the ground. It expanded with a thick wet gust and settled. The rain eased. The clouds thinned just enough that a little sick light could creep in, The bulge disconnected from the cloud layer and became a taught sphere in the middle of the road whistling and rushing.

Consider a sh*tty trailer park Magical Girl on the way to death, stealing and scraping and bullying crumpled old f*ckers on the street who would wake up the next morning wondering why they were missing their paycheck. The powers that be took her in because Three sounded better than Two. God forbid, she started to feel good about herself. Say she stretched beyond her bounds and failed to do the best possible thing. Everyone else did too.

But let no dumpster girl live above her station. The world itself forsook her. Small wonder she wasn't transmogrified into salt, not that it was too late.

"DYSON MALECKI," said the cloud ball.

"Shut the f*ck up," spat Dorchester, "Get out of the hamster sphere and show your face you pathetic sh*t."

A pause. The ball spun. Hollis was ready to duck behind the engine when it lobbed one of those electricity bolt things, and she decided to actually just go ahead and do that. A long moment later she peeked out shamefully. The ball receded into the clouds above three Magical Girls, two goons headed by who else. Her coat ruffled, her sash glowed sadly in the dim non-light. "Maintain your dignity. You had to know we couldn't let you go."

"You will let me go," snarled Dorchester.

"No. Let's wrap this up."

Dorchester shook. "As if I'm afraid, of a couple f*cking recruits, and a second in command halfweight like you."

Storm girl sighed. "Okay, Ames?"

sh*t. Hollis froze.What?

"I understand you've been trapped. All you have to do is step over here. We can protect you, and we'll give you fair treatment. No strings."

The longest lie she'd ever pulled off, unraveling before her eyes. Hollis was just tired.

"Make the right-"

"DON'T TALK TO MY SUBORDINATE" howled Dorchester as she plunged onto the road shielded in a spectral wave. The USMF girls split instantly, Dorchester blundered between them, they closed back and cut her off from the minivan. Stormcloud girl whirled her wand-thing like a baton as the sky began to crackle and thicken once more. Her goons prowled towards Dorchester, who had twirled around and now waved her scroll in billowing circles. The gibberish latin began to glow and some grey particulate coalesced like pollen but before anything could happen stormcloud girl flicked her wand and BANG, Dorchester was airborne trailing smoke down the road.

One goon split off to follow - the other looked over her shoulder at Hollis, who was preoccupied with cringing away from flying rubble (she bore the umbrella as a shield and it flew from her hand, the minivan pinged all over with invisible ricochets) and didn't fully notice until the girl was striding up. She had a gun out, an oversized wild west dragoon in fitting with her sparkly cowboy-but-with-a-skirt deal. Hollis raised one and a quarter arms.Hey listen I'm not part of this, do whatever you want.

Thanks,said the goon. She hustled up the remaining distance and waved her gun.Let's get up on the road, alright.

Hollis backed away from the minivan and circled around and stepped up on the road. The girl pushed her a little further on the asphalt and raised her free hand.Stop.

Do I just stand here,said Hollis. A distant explosion buzzed the air.

Yeah that's good,nodded the girl, and she shot Hollis in the chest. The effect was like a shotgun blast - bone crumpled, flesh blew off and hung in strips. Hollis collapsed. As she hit the ground the second shot caved in her entire upper face.

Interesting situation. Near total blackout. Better Magical Girls could compensate with magic and technique, but a weakling like Hollis had to rely on bodily constitution rather than high quality soulstuff, and that meant if you took a hunk out of her central nervous system you couldn't expect much more than a zombie shuffle.

What even would be the point? Shooting her was a definitive statement: don't be an issue, wait and we'll process you. If she had actually intended anything permanent then she would have gone for the Gem. No reason to push it. Better just lay here. It suited Hollis well, maybe she'd inherited some kind of autonomic comprehension from her many years as a walking cadaver, and in this penultimate moment, laid out on the asphalt with no discernable motive or hope, the habit had finally achieved a life of its own.

The only tricky thing was she could still hear. Why this particular cluster of nerves survived who knew. It became annoying. If she just tilted her head the problem might snuff itself out, but it was best not to move at all, so she didn't.

Footsteps squidged on the nearby asphalt. A grassy swish, a car doork-chnk. Limp wristed protestation heralded the approach, footsteps came up the shoulder again plus two more and the slim weight of a slim girl hit the road within arm's reach. "No," choked Ryatt. The dragoon boomed, Ryatt shrieked like a chihuahua. Hollis' chill broke, she cringed in distaste, the ruins of her face puckered like one orifice. How was she supposed to sustain all this noise?

The footsteps stickily hustled back off the road. Ryatt sniveled and hitched.Hollis,she said,Hollis please they shot off my knee.

Why are you crying? What did I say about being tough, Ryatt? What the f*ck did I say. You don't even listen to me.

But I don't wanna die,sobbed Ryatt.

You're not gonna die, I'm talking to you right now just fine motherf*cker. Get it together. Jesus.

But what if she crushes my Gem!

She's just trying to intimidate you. Obviously it worked.

Though where was this trust coming from? Trust in the USMF. Magical Girls that had every reason to hate the Charleston Three. Oh, and they'd lie, they always did. But wait for the right moment.

Hollis tried to remain still.What's she doing right now.

I can't tell I don't know she's in the minivan, I think she's getting something out? I don't know,moaned Ryatt.

sh*t. Hollis fumbled for her bag.Okay you need to tell me if she does anything else and you need to do what I say, alright? You need to f*cking focus, you're panicking, stop panicking and get your sh*t in line.

Ryatt audibly wheezed.I'm trying.

Okay well keep f*cking trying, it's important.Hollis focused on the thing in the bag, not the usual way she did it but a fully assembled article, a pistol of master level quality whatever that meant, chambered for the largest caliber she could picture. Her head began to feel like the broken egg it was, her bones became grimy. She barely maintained the wherewithal to tug the gun out and shove it under her body.

She's coming out,said tremulous Ryatt.She's got a gun, she's got a rifle, she's staring at me!

Calm down. I've got a plan, just wait and listen and we'll all be fine.

Steps on the road. Blood and other fluids congealed in her throat. The steps got closer,she's comingsaid Ryatt and Hollis almost lost her sh*t, she knew that, she knew what was happening, didn't she have a f*cking plan for it, didn't she say that? The stupidity, the noise - but if she even twitched then it was done, it would happen instantly and without remorse. Breathe: no, don't. But listen. Here she comes.

When the steps were beside her she leapt up or tried but her dead fish body was slow. The final moment extended cruelly, irrationally, maybe the cowgirl was genuinely surprised and therefore slow to punish - but before Hollis could fumble her gun into alignment with where she thought the enemy was, the inevitable occurred. Boom and her ears rang, holes peppered her legs and waist and her Gem went pop crack fizzle. She slumped for a half-instant. And remained alive.

Right. What a dumb thing to forget. She fired.

Brrrakk!The physical constraints of the pistol should have allowed twelve discharges at most: but this gun was custom and magical, so it got out double that amount in a fully automatic burst. Hollis' hand immediately shattered. The effect was that about half of the bullets went shrieking away from Hollis' intended target - assuming that she had even been accurate in the first place. The gun went clattering elsewhere.

She waited to be shot again. She wasn't. No distinct sound either, beyond the hissing rain, the flatbmpof distant explosions. She jerked her hand towards her bag less to actually grab anything than to scare the cowgirl into doing something, making some noise, anything at all. Indeed, someone did scuffle, but that was just Ryatt, you could tell from the whimpering.

What a state, when this was in effect her only connection to such important information. To go through Ryatt, to be beholden to her - a fate worse than death? She would rather just sit here and not know.

"Hollis," Ryatt finally choked out, "Hollis she's not moving what do I do?"

You check if she's still alive, how about that, because I can't see. Get her Gem.

Scuff, scuff. "I don't think I can find it. Hollis she's got no head."

Listen to me I need you to roll her over and really look.

"What if she is alive, she'll attack me, she'll kill me."

Ryatt you useless f*ck, do what I'm telling you. If she's alive she gets up anyway and she kills our asses, you saw that sh*t, she had murderous intent before I blasted her, so how do you want to bet she's gonna be merciful now? They only way you're safe is if you get the f*cking Gem so wrap your puss*fied sensibilities around that and GET THE GEM.

Ryatt said nothing. Hollis listened to shivering breath, tumbling limbs.

"Um," warbled Ryatt, "I think I found it."

Okay keep hold of that.

"No, that's, I'm not sure. There's pieces."

Hollis swallowed. She tottered onto her knees, she extended her hand.Let me feel.

Ryatt squidged over and dropped them in Hollis' palm, four or five razor bits that sure did feel a lot like broken f*cking Gem. She tried to squeeze them and when her shattered fingers wouldn't cut it she scattered them windward like birdseed.Okay get me up, we need to go to the car.

It was grueling. Ryatt was too timid to do much more than pull her by the arm, and Hollis had shot peppered legs and a missing hunk of spine and no eyes. She kept bumping into sh*t everywhere she stepped, heavy chunks and branches tossed by a million explosions to obscure her path. She cursed and spat, an arthritic hag-creature.

Ryatt did eventually succeed in getting her to the back seat. Hollis crept in like a slug.Tell me if you see anyone come cubes are in the back, go get them.

Ryatt vanished. She was being oddly efficient. It was possibly suspicious, but Ryatt didn't merit any worry. Probably she was just that broken in.

Had Hollis really killed that cowgirl? It was possible that what Ryatt had found wasn't a Gem but a gem, you couldn't tell with remains - not that the girl was a danger, she probably would have already gotten up if she could, but was she dead was the question. Maybe not.

Clink clink like a box of christmas ornaments. Hollis grabbed it and dropped her Gem in and sagged.Listen you said you have a car, can you drive? Can you drive fast?

"Not fast."

You may need to drive fast, they're gonna come for us. In fact they're probably coming right now, which is why you need to get in the front seat right now, go.

Ryatt went. "Do you think they killed her, they got Dorchester?"

That was one bullsh*t powerful magical girl and she had a buddy too, I bet they f*cking vaporized her. I want you to look, are you looking? Rearview mirror, tell me if they're coming.

"I don't see anyone," said Ryatt.

Okay,Hollis found her door and slammed it,Well f*ck it then we're gone, pull out. And tell me if you see anything.

Wind hooted in the minivan's frame. Ryatt fiddled with something in the front. The silence extended beyond reasonable limits before she found the gearshift and chunked it and they began to roll forward. With great care and much braking they bump-bumped onto the road in a gradual weave, Ryatt mumbling and hissing to herself. "Where do I go there's stuff everywhere."

Away from the way the f*ckers that want to kill us went, what do you think? And just run over the damn stuff.

"But one way is that lightning girl and the other is Yolanda!" Her voice crackled on the edge of hysterics.

Okay f*ck you're right,groaned Hollis,hold the hell on.She pawed in her bag. This many cubes should have made all the difference but what the effort gained her was not a phone, but crippling nausea. She held in her guts barely. New tack.Look around up front, there's probably a phone, it should be ringing.

It should have been but wasn't. Was she so weak she could no longer connect? No: an insipid warble touched the wind. Hollis couldn't orient but Ryatt filled her in. "I think it's on the girl."

Why not.I guess we need to go back and get it then because I don't know how the hell to get out of here and even if I did as you may be able to see I have no eyes. Turn around.

Ryatt began to. Then she slammed on the brakes so hard that even at this crawling pace Hollis was thrown around. She tried to compose a reprimand but Ryatt's cringing whisper came first, "Hollis I see someone!"

f*ck off. Who? Where?

"She's right ahead, Hollis what do I do, do I keep turning, please tell me what to do I don't know what I'm doing!"

CALM DOWN,said Hollis.Okay look you need to drive! Don't do the turn that'll slow us down too much we need to get past her and she'll probably try to shoot us so you'll need to evade! Drive straight ahead and tell me if something happens! Faster than that,because though Ryatt had followed her orders the wind was whipping too slowly,faster! f*cking faster!

The minivan bucked over hard objects and detritus and skipped like a stone and Ryatt screamed something but couldn't be heard and Hollis' tiny world was narrowing to a needle tip. What was this? Could she feel herself healing faster now, her blown out skull pulling back up and welding together, new eyes congealing as her heart beat back into existence, and in this flying floating genuine touched-by-jesus miracle was there a feeling, a rush of sorts, that brushed away darkness and turned it laughable? Was she laughing?

"I'M PAST HER," screamed Ryatt.

Drive!howled Hollis, her mint condition eyes just opening as she leaned out the window to witness,DRIVE YOU BITCH!

She was breathless with untouchability, what could only be freedom. The branches on all the trees were not blowing and jousting in the wind, but applauding the dash, the scathing brush with death. Their nemesis dropped, too slow to intercept a flaming missile, and what a situation when even Yolanda had to be thanked for her part, her sh*tty enchantments blessings! Hollis braced with her new arm (new arm!) and tried to see the scowl on this bitch, how her face would contort at such a f*cking turn, oh god she had to see it. And she saw it.

Oh.

"What?" Ryatt peered in the mirror and jolted and braked their speed in half. Hollis tumbled to the floor, cubes raining down all around her. She barely snatched her Gem before it rolled under the seat. Idiot! Why say anything? The real solution was

Ryatt keep going it's fine.

"What! She'll kill us!"

She has to catch us first now GO.

But Ryatt hesitated, gibbering and doing hover hands on the steering wheel until something crucial was lost. Hollis clambered back onto the seat and ducked out to see again the haggard form. Dorchester trailed sooty rags as she closed the distance.

Too dismal to watch. Hollis slipped back in her seat and gazed vacantly ahead.Stop the car.

"Okay," whispered Ryatt.

The moment the minivan stopped Hollis gathered her limited mettle and got out facing the approaching creature.Dorchester I apologize for that as you can guess at the speeds we were going it was hard to make out faces but I apologize nonetheless, we meant nothing by it and I hope you know that.

"You tried to leave me behind."

Hollis eyed Dorchester's neckline. Clap clap clap, branches.We stopped right when we knew.

"You tried."

Hollis said nothing. Ryatt sniffled by the driver's side door. Dorchester pushed past her, and Hollis dipped numbly into the back seat as did Ryatt. And they resumed the journey.

How could Hollis have known? Until recently she hadn't had definitive proof.

The power imbalance. The symmetry. Three against three - two split after one, one splits after two. The venue, the storm, all that energy flowing, every reason to think it should exert concrete malignance. Logically, in an ordered world, events should play out to the destruction of Dorchester, Hollis, Ryatt.

Since that hadn't happened, something had to be wrong. It could only be the initial assumption. So maybe, structure such as it existed was meaningless. Chaos transcended all parameters, even the most airtight situation could guarantee nothing. Entropy! Did anything describe this experience better?

But, if nothing was permanent, that included chaos. According to the new rules the decay could in fact decay, the de-evolution devolving into evolution and a fresh state of affairs, so: there was reason to expect an unexpected circ*mstance to come along and annihilate annihilation, thus delivering the penitent sinner unto sweet death or continued life free of the most directly unbearable curses.

Bullsh*t, but it felt real anyway.

Coming from straight ahead with such hesitance that Hollis wondered if it might have been a heatless mirage or a trick of the rain appeared headlights. They approached at great speed - in seconds details made themselves apparent past the blare. The candy yellow sedan shone explosively despite the subpar lighting of this cursed dimension. It had a vague blur for a driver, and as it flashed by the helpless astronaut seemed to turn their head, wondering. It began to recede as fast as it had arrived.

Dorchester slammed on brakes with no warning whatsoever. Hollis barely shielded herself from another broken nose, with the disadvantage that when Dorchester continued the maneuver into a hairpin turn at still considerable speed Hollis entered a sort of roll. She slid into Ryatt, who may have started crying.

Hollis fought back into her seat and clawed for the seatbelt. It took an embarrassingly long time, she was preoccupied with what the actual hell Dorchester was doing, aborting their escape to pursue this random guy with his average car. Though Hollis thought she knew. She also wanted to ditch the minivan, since when Yolanda made an exit every miserable enchantment she ever made would go with her. Assuming Dorcherster was still capable of thought, that had to be what she was thinking.

It couldn't end in anything but death. Likely that of the squishy human victim. If Dorchester was paying any attention she understood that the boundaries were gone, and in that case what mattered the average chump?

They closed in. Dorchester's tight guidance of the steering wheel shifted into something feral and crouching. Corrosive whispers dribbled under her breath and her face - Hollis saw it in the rearview mirror - suggested that she was preparing to twist off heads. Under the circ*mstances exactly one option remained, which was stay quiet and low and let happen what may. Nothing was important about this. Screw the guy. Not like she could do anything.

But at the final approach, when they were mere feet from the sedan (erratic, slowing and accelerating in staccato paroxysms of confusion) she poked her head between the seats and saidWe shouldn't do this.

Dorchester responded by swerving wildly to the other lane and gunning it. Hollis toppled back into her seat, where she impacted hard but didn't bounce thanks to the garroting seatbelt. She choked but continued.Look I'm sorry and maybe if we find an abandoned car it's cool but I don't like this.

She might not have even been heard. Dorchester turned onto the right lane and as soon as the sedan's headlights had aligned in the back window she pumped the brakes into a steady decline. The sedan moved as if to pass, but Dorchester swerved to intercept and it backed off, also slowing. Hollis struggled back into the gap,Dorchester I-

Dorchester's grabbed Hollis by the roots of her scalp and in an instant ripped her halfway out of her seatbelt, through the seats, Hollis unable to do anything but writhe and unspool into the front seat. Dorchester slammed her face the dashboard, and as the passenger airbag exploded and swamped Hollis she bucked open the door and whirled out. Hollis fought the airbag, a battle she seemed doomed to lose for even as she doubled down to tear apart this deflating pillowcase she found that it tied and constrained her fully, and the fibers would not give. Since when was she so puny? She spat at the sh*tty thing and what she spat was blood and teeth.

Finally she disentangled herself enough to open the door and spill out though the airbag still clung parasitically, somehow it had hooked onto her foot and as she kicked it didn't dislodge but tore suddenly from its housing, so while she scrabbled around the minivan the horrible gheist trailed behind her and tripped her up every third step, no time to bend down and pull it off, she saw instantly that it had come true, Dorchester had pulled out a guy in a t-shirt and khaki shorts, she had her book out and everything, so Hollis rushed forward and pointed dramatically,Dorchester don't kill him!

Upon the completion of this thought her foot hung on the airbag and she went down in flames. She the side of her head conked against the asphalt with a sound that suggested the healing process might not have extended to her brain and therefore could account for otherwise inexplicable stupidity. She squinted: had she done it?

She had. Dorchester gave her a pinched look suggestive of the sight of rotten meat. Hollis was at a loss to interpret what it could mean. Impropriety? Oh big f*cking deal.

The guy took his chance to get up, hands raised. "Who are you," he shouted.

Dorchester spun. "You will tell them when they ask. I am innocent of the crimes they are hunting me down for. Only because the USMF has driven me to this point do I defend myself. The actions of my subordinates notwithstanding I have done nothing to deserve this treatment. I was even willing to bend to their petty despotism, but now they'll have me killed. Yet I have the standards they claim to. I defended my territory of Dorchester with honor, and what have they done with it in my absence?"

The man, gaping, angled transparently for a path back to his car. Did he really think he could get past?

"I have followed this: they gave it to an oligarchy of idiots to exploit. No more cubes come from it, it's useless. That's what's happening everywhere, and soon it will matter, and when it does the Magi they've disinherited will matter too. They cannot forget us." She stalked to the sedan.

"What the f*ck do youmean-"

Dorchester whipped something under her shoulder directly at him. Hollis choked, even though knives were Yolanda's gimmick, despite Dorchester's Morality Hour, because who knew? But the object clattered into the guy's chest and fell to the ground and it was keys. "Take the minivan," said Dorchester as she dipped into the sedan.

Oh no. Hollis fought to her feet despite the tyranny of the airbag, "Wait hold on what about the guns, we need those, he can't have them. He shouldn't have them. What if he tries to shoot us?" She looked at the man in question for support. No time for shame, Hollis could not feel it, she was invincible.

Dorchester hovered malevolently behind the windshield.You disgust me,she said.

"No look," in her desperation she had become loud and brash, the man twitched, she recalibrated,Look I'll tell you what we need to do is if we're really switching cars we need to get what we can out of there and blow the rest up okay I can do that I've got the explosives it's all cool, and this guy can f*cking hack it, he'll be fine if that's your concern which I doubt but if it is. Do you want them to get this sh*t? Maybe they can track it, what about that? Do you want that?

Hollis you are the flotsam that drifts on a scum pond. You are social driftwood. When I took you under my wing I expected that you would learn, but you have become no less pathetic or stupid. Your uses are limited and increasingly cost ineffective. You're tiresome. What do you think it will earn you to act this way? A hat, a medal?

Hollis swallowed. She kicked the ground and the airbag stuck.You aren't hot sh*t either.

Dorchester slammed her door shut.You have two minutes. If you try to bring back anything other than grief cubes and Ryatt I will run you down.

Okay. f*ck it. Hollis shuffled past the guy and went around and jerked open Ryatt's door.Ryatt come on I guess we're f*cking leaving.

"Nooo," cried Ryatt. She literally batted at Hollis' hands.

That's just how it is,said Hollis. She caught one of Ryatt's noodle arms and pulled her towards the minivan. Ryatt submitted almost instantly but wore a particular slowness for its duration, she had to be steered and she would not look to see where they were going. When Hollis dropped her into the back of the car she collapsed like a duffle bag. Hollis had to kick her legs in before she could close the door.

As she went back she shot Dorchester a weird improvised hand signal as though it might prevent her from being mowed down - but something got in the way because when she grabbed the cubes and returned the sedan was still there. She football carried the box past the hapless guy and ducked into the passenger seat. Dorchester chucked the car into reverse.

"Hey no," said the man, arm outstretched.

But the car was already whipping around. He retreated to the minivan and milled there in the rain shouting and waving. Once they had fully turned and were swooping directly away from him he commenced to flip them off doubly, kick the minivan's tires, stomp childishly. In the final stage he put his hands on his neck in some form of cradle and stared, forced now to see the fruition of inevitability. Even from this far away you could see that it devastated him. A bad thing done, a piece of dignity and property stolen. Probably the guy had earned his stupid yellow car.

But nobody dead. They could just drive away.

"Stop smiling," said Dorchester.

Hollis stopped.

Contrary to previous evidence the airbag had not fused with her boot. She was able to peel it off in short order. A pathetic sort of ghost, grey with road grit, blotched all over in red-brown. She rolled down the window and dumped it. It was immediately pelted into the ground by an undulation of rain. Similarly blasted, Hollis brought the window back up. At the moment it sealed, the rain shut off. The cloud layer split open and isolated into wisps of fog which burned up amidst unadulterated sunlight. Then the blue sky. A few regular clouds hovered in the far distance. Moisture streaked on the window, thinned, and flicked away.

Dorchester pulled over. An easy stop by a blank road - no center line, even. "Ames," she said, "We need to paint the car."

Hollis looked at her and did not see and then saw. "How do you suggest."

"Sprayer. You have permission to use however many cubes."

How rare. Hollis dropped her Gem in the box and circled the car, sizing it up.

Once she'd wanted to rob a bank, cinema style. The problem was getting the paint on the metal without getting it everywhere else, why every other motherf*cker who wanted a change of car without the change of car didn't just carry around spray cans, they'd glance the windows and tires and just look like assholes when they got caught. You needed adjustable spray. Also paint, also somewhere to do it, also the skill to finish before someone rolled by and called the cops anyway. Way too impractical on the whole, better just drop the car.

Except for Hollis. She could run a tube right out her bag - inefficient in the long run, tanks were better, but if there ever was a time. She puffed the contraption experimentally and it worked, nice little cloud of burgundy. She started at the trunk and worked her way along.

Really. She slid. The weird smile came back. She worked on the back doors, the roof, shining paint, a smell like candy. It was getting done entirely too fast. How to divert? Ryatt was bunched up in the back seat, looking dead. Hollis tapped the back window.Ryatt I want to talk.

What,croaked Ryatt.

What do you want to talk about? Anything at all.

I don't know.

How about Texas, you've gotta have questions about Texas, Texas was my idea and I've got questions. Come on you'll feel better work with me here.

I don't think I trust you to tell me what makes me feel better.

Hoo.Ryatt that's unfair.What's going on? Gem?

It's fine.

Doesn't sound fine.

Ryatt twisted.It's kinda dark,she murmured.

Hollis yanked open the back door and stuck her hand in. Ryatt passed her Gem over, which was indeed very muddy at a glance. Hollis dumped it in the box.

Now let's talk.

Ryatt extended a molluscoid arm and pulled her door closed.

Ryatt!

About what. I don't want to talk about Texas, Texas is a nightmare. Every moment I spend thinking about Texas is painful.

Well maybe we can talk about that later and you'll feel a little better, we can do something else, maybe-

I won't, I'll just start hiding it.

-maybe that, that honesty there.Hollis held herself back from a pirouette, what the f*ck?Now look I'm in favor in fact this is exactly what I was talking about before when I said you needed to be more of a Magical Girl - you can't dissemble, you have to make yourself known. And this is where you f*ck up, you don't say sh*t when it needs to be said, you bow down, and I get it, tough situation, but listen. This is a great opportunity to get in the mold.

I'm tired.

You need to strike a balance. Okay? This is your chance. You need to be ready to move even if you're tired, even if you're on the edge. It's even more than that. You have to watch yourself, you'll sneak sh*t in otherwise. There's how to save yourself. You've got a chance we never had, you're young and you're obviously out of the loop and yeah you're a bad Magical Girl, but that's fine. You've got it if you take it. So you should f*cking take it.

Sure,said Ryatt.

You know what, fine, f*ck her. Hollis just finished her work, stepped back, and, Wow. Was she wrong or had the bodywork changed a little? Sometimes even shoddy magic could excel.

Dorchester coughed. "Get the license plate," she nodded on the way to the driver's seat.

Hollis got it. A perfectly sized screwdriver appeared in her hand and she pried the little plate off and wheeled it into the trees. Dorchester slammed her door and Hollid tingled with the sense of pre-departure even though she was certain she would not be left behind now. She pulled from the elastic opening of her bag a new plate and cranked it on and ran ran ducked into the passenger seat. And they were gone.

Chapter 4: Thy Mother's Womb Thine Urn

Chapter Text

They found traffic. Dorchester navigated silently, her ashen face expressionless. For untold miles nobody noticed them. Whatever faerie curse they'd just escaped showed no signs of returning. Hollis barely understood how relieved she was.

A cop car zipped past them and continued on its way.

Onto Interstate 95, a bare concrete expanse upon which they mingled with bullet-driven masses among a gallery of lowborn swamp trees. Dorchester's whims increasingly oriented towards speed, slipping by semi-trailers in gulf stream swoops, stylish bullsh*t. Hollis rolled down the window and stuck her head in the airstream to suck in the drug. No figure on how long they'd been on the run, the count was in hours - but it was cool. From here on out, a cinch.

Hollis reclined into her seat. She had an idea. "Let's stop somewhere."

"No."

She got out a phone and scrolled until she found a dumb name, a nearby address, and ratings of middling affection. Hollis showed the screen, Dorchester wouldn't look. "Do you want us to crash, Hollis? Read it."

"It's just an inn. It's sh*tty, we can lay low there."

Dorchester set her jaw. But thirty minutes later, when the GPS said, they rumbled off the interstate.

It looked like it belonged in a motor. Flat and L-shaped with wire frame pseudo balconies that had the look of chrome without depth or substance. The few cars had a uniform tendency towards depressive age. If you wanted quality, drive further. For her part Hollis yearned for a flea-ridden, hepatitis-stained mattress. The fun cynical bent would enable her to take in this incomprehensible day with something approaching reflection. And there had to be alcohol. She was going to buy or pilfer the sh*ttiest beer imaginable and drink it, in this place, as the most important statement of her life.

She glowed at Dorchester as they parked. "We made it."

Dorchester detransformed and stepped out, slamming the door. Ryatt stirred.

Hollis retrieved her Gem from the cubes box and transformed herself back to normal as well (the lifting of a burden, she could finally breathe), then extracted Ryatt. As they shuffled awkwardly over humped asphalt it came to her that afternoon was becoming night. The bruised edge of the world brought on a downdraft of cold air. Ryatt seemed to pull closer.

Dorchester had vanished but was easily found behind a metal door at the far end of the building labeled CHECK IN. She spoke with somebody, a guy at a homely salvage desk. He sighed drowsily as Hollis dragged Ryatt inside, the rolls of his fat head inflating. "With you?"

"No."

"So one room." He named a price.

Dorchester immediately slipped out the door. Hollis waited for about a minute before she caught on. She hustled out, "Forgot something," she told the guy, and found Dorchester halfway across the parking lot, glaring. Hollis conjured a wallet and handed it over. Dorchester rifled, picked the bills she wanted, and went inside. A few instants later she exited and headed for the stairs, followed by trembling Ryatt.

"So how'd it go," said Hollis.

Dorchester stuffed her hands in her pockets. She said nothing.

The dingy scaffold howled as they ascended. The door Dorchester stopped in front of had a huge dent in the middle, like someone hauled off with a fire extinguisher. She unlocked the door, groped inside, flicked a switch. The light dawned on...a sh*tty hotel room. One bed of middling size, drab colors. The carpet had blotches and the ceiling bowed in but otherwise it was fine.

Dorchester nodded, imperious, "We'll stay here tonight."

B-but where would they sleep? Not all on the bed surely? No, what? Hollis shook herself off and found a chair.

"Look and see what the news says," said Dorchester. Well, what better way to get in the mood. Hollis pored over her phone for information and soon uncovered a nice timeline with all the events. Two Magical Girls confirmed deceased with four others in serious condition, a policeman mauled in his car, another man in critical condition, and yet another picked up near the initial escape vehicle, saying that three girls had stolen his bright yellow Honda, license plate listed.

Nothing related to Yolanda, though. Huh…

Ryatt sat on the edge of the bed, pale. Dorchester stood in the middle of their cube, tall in her awful t-shirt, staring at the stone dead Barbie Mansion TV. Ryatt flattened out on the sheets like a dehydrated insect. Dorchester got on her knees and swept the floor for a remote.

Nope. Hollis decided. The point had been reached. She dropped the phone on the floor and walked out. Deep night had already occurred somehow, pressing on her as she edged along the railing and went down into the parking lot. Their burgundy car looked expensive beside the rest of the worn beasts, crouched among weed-widened cracks.

She poked her head into the office. "Is there anywhere I can buy some beer?"

"What," said the manager, like a startled cow. "Who are you girl?"

Hollis stepped back and let the door close. She sat on the bottom of the staircase and rubbed her eyes deeply. Darkling mosquitos hummed and pecked her rash resistant skin. A cat ambled through the cars, skittering away at the sight of her. Unseeing cars rushed along the road.

MissAmes,said Kyubey, who had appeared on the step directly above her.

"I know."

Untrue. If you had any conception of the gravity of your actions you could not be so cavalier.

"Haha, yeah."

To be clear, I cannot in good conscience recommend that you go without punishment. Consider yourself fortunate that termination is no longer on the table. I may be forced to aid in your capture.

He wasn't even wrong. Hollis truly did not care.

Only as it becomes necessary, though. Recent erraticism aside, I remain willing to assist.The USMF always has openings. If you become sensible I'll have reason to influence the odds in your favor.

"Thanks a lot ratboy, I'll be sure to do that."

I hope so.He hopped down and into the parking lot.Be aware that Miss Bedlowe is still alive, and has expressed a desire to reunite. You may wish to hurry.

Hollis sat up but he was already out of sight.

She relaxed. No problem really. What chance did she have of getting here with no trail or track? Let Yolanda plague someone else, it was basically fine.

She poked her head into their room, where Dorchester and Ryatt remained in more or less the same positions. "I'm getting some drink," she said, "Do you want any?"

Dorchester nodded. "Whiskey will be fine."

Oh? Hokay.

Down the road Hollis discovered a glowing gas station. She mimicked the sparse clientele, head down, shoulders up as she perused walls of beer, dirt wine, 'moonshine', liquor in many neon colors. The teller alone had the ability to discern her. She looked on as Hollis deposited a six pack, assorted whiskey flavors, and a beautiful handle of good vodka.

"This isn't going to work," said the teller.

Hollis flipped several hundred dollars in twenties onto the counter. She looked around expressively at the nobody-who-cared. The teller swept the bills off the counter and commenced bagging the goods.

Hollis strolled over the platform, no point in maintaining the slouch, she started back down. Precisely then a tortured white station wagon lurched from around the building. Hollis stepped onto the shoulder as it idled up the road and stopped beside her, the window sliding down on some kid, an acne mound in a tieless dress shirt.

She flattened her face. "Yeah?"

"We need to talk. How about get in and I drive you."

Hollis squinted for a resemblance, nothing stood out. "Who are you exactly?"

A car screamed up behind the station wagon, braked hard, and swerved around in a blueshifted horn blast. The kid looked irritably over his shoulder. "I know who you are."

Uh? "Okay."

Another car came, brakes honk swerve. He cursed, glanced at her, "I'll be there," and goosed down the road.

He was in the parking lot when she got there. She bent at the open window.

"You're a Magical Girl."

"Yeah?"

"You have something to do with a girl named Ryatt who's also a Magical Girl.

"Mhm?"

"I want you to let her go."

Hollis eyed him. He was gangly but had stupid fat cheeks. "You're aware she's wanted? She's in. No take backsies. What you could do is slide out before you get your spine bent backwards, and she doesn't get it on her conscience."

"I'm telling you let her go."

"I'm telling you f*ck you. Hot sh*t gonna track down some Magical Girls." She started to turn. "Don't bother me again. Bye."

"Wait." He stuffed his hand into his pocket, rooting, and pulled out a small, limp pistol.

Hollis placed the bags on the ground. "No."

He pointed the gun.

"No." Hollis descended through the window to bear above him. Before he could move she seized his wrist. "Give."

He struggled a little but then kind of just gave way and transferred it to her and slid away like a trapped animal.

"Is this loaded," said Hollis, and she checked. "I've never been so scandalized in my life. You f*cking boy."

He squirmed and wouldn't look at her.

"The whole deal," Hollis waved the pistol evocatively, "the whole f*cking scoop on Magical Girls is we're durable. Peons understand this. You probably don't even f*cking get what I'm saying? Watch." She pressed the pistol to her kneecap and pulled the trigger POP. "I don't care. I can heal it. With MAGIC."

He was only sitting there all drawn up so she reached in and grabbed him by the shoulder to get a look at him. "sh*t, who are you anyway? What's the interest in Ryatt?"

"I'm a friend," he mumbled.

"You're a f*cking creep. I don't want you around Ryatt, weirdass." Hollis laughed and let him go. "Name."

"P-Pembrook."

"Peter. Could have killed your ass. I might still if you don't get f*cking lost. Capiche?"

He nodded.

She tossed the gun and he fumbled it in floppy hands. "Don't get ideas about ratting because I'll find you and Ryatt will be the one to suffer anyway, they kill girls like her, they'll tell you otherwise but think on whether they'd let a chump in on that kind of sh*t. Go." She slapped the door, stepped haltingly back. Her kneecap detached and dangled. As he stared she did expansive semaphore into the parking lot, repeating it until he backed the station wagon out and drove away.

When he disappeared she punched the air! No irreversible harm at all. A girl like Hollis. sh*t, and she could have put him through the floorboard. By all rights.

She dragged her bad leg to the sedan and sat inside with a handful of cubes on her Gem until the kneecap stuck. When done she shuffled out of the car and up, overtaking the stairs with a repeated leaping motion. As she shouldered into the apartment and found somewhere to sit Dorchester looked her over. "Gunshot."

"I fixed it."

"Okay." She returned to the dead TV, remoteless.

They worked out arrangements. Ryatt (dubiously alive) took up the bed so the options became two chairs and the floor. Hollis grabbed one and dragged it to the other side of the room. Dorchester set up in front of the TV. The little lamp next to the bed snuffed out. Hollis held her knee to keep it stuck. Her neck and brain pulsed.

Oh. Damndest thing, she'd forgotten the fun. But she was already asleep.

The room was unchanged when she woke but had developed desolation, as though parched by a mummy curse. Ryatt sat up in the bed fisheyed and Dorchester was watching the nonfunctional TV. Everything seemed to be missing its essential core.

For the first minute of wakefulness Hollis had little idea of anything. When it came back to her she cringed. Some f*cko bum was having a fun time right now.

She got up to move past it. Her knee felt fine now, maybe a little squeaky, but okay. She cracked her joints and breathed in the mildew air. To think that any moment she could have escaped. Nothing stopped her even now. Better to move if she wanted to be free - but Hollis was forced to concede on that front. Some kind of transformation had occurred. Dorchester and Ryatt were tolerable now, even allies. Unity was possible.

Anyway, things would probably just disband. Dorchester looked twenty years older and had the pall of a dementia patient, no way she lasted as leader. And Ryatt, hell, she wasn't anything, all she did was suffer. Good. That was growth. Confronted with pain, she would have no choice but to recognize her weakness and improve her dumb, bad life. Tactics, application - and with someone experienced to provide knowledge…

"Where's the alcohol," said Dorchester.

"Outside."

"Okay."

Maybe it wasn't still there but Hollis could totally get more. In fact, f*ck it. "I'm gonna go out," she said, nodding to Dorchester, nodding to Ryatt. Go and get 'em.

Right as she reached the door she stopped. The peephole was stone black.

She felt the smoothness of the doorknob. She looked over her shoulder. Both of them watched. She shuffled and opened the door.

Yolanda, healthy and complete, raised in one hand a bouquet of plastic bags. "You're welcome."

Chapter 5: Om Tat Sat

Chapter Text

"So I bet you're wondering," said Yolanda, sitting splay legged like a cowpoke in the middle of the room and animatedly gesturing. She was the only living being - though Hollis leaned against the far wall and watched, while Dorchester sat across from Yolanda and Ryatt hid in the corner, all were reft of ambulation by the sucking aura of Yolanda's expressivity. Hollis barely retained the energy to gnaw her tongue.

"I bet you're wondering what all happened."

"I am," said Dorchester.

"Look. I was planning to take the guy's car. Didn't work, miscalculation, I admit it. When he took us into the trees he killed the engine good. And sure, he radioed, so backup was coming. Well, I wasn't pissed enough to die, so I hid. A few times I thought I was caught but nope, I worked through their little net, and I got out. But you guys had the car, and I didn't, so that left me kind of f*cked, right?"

She waited for an answer. None came.

"Wrong! Bet you thought I just fixed it, Hollis. But I was thinking what if we got separated. sh*t, a tracking enchantment isn't complex, I make 'em whenever. Then all you have to do is follow." She snapped her fingers meaninglessly. "I had to jack a ride, which I did, but I got there and guess what, you guys were gone. Then the USMF showed up and wow was this getting depressing."

Yolanda paused to gasp for no reason, clearly she enjoyed the spectacle, she came in grinning and hadn't stopped, she gesticulated at almost every moment to the stony world. You'd have to pass directly by her to escape.

"Again, I'm f*cked! Totally screwed! No way out! They want blood and if they find me I'm dead. And I start thinking, what the hell, why not shoot for the moon? What I do is I tail them. Miles and miles, they're moving to a secure location. And I wait until they stop moving, hang out until night. And I go in and get the minivan."

"You go in," said Dorchester.

"I go in. Buncha stupid f*ckers. You know these people can't even fight, I whacked their asses. The way I drove out of there they couldn't track me no way. And then all night, all the way here-" She beamed. "But you're wondering, how did I find you? If you didn't have the minivan, right. I can't believe it f*cking worked out this way guys, just wait. Because otherwise I had no clue, you were gone gone. But think. Hollis."

Hollis stared.

"Come to it yourself."

Hollis came to it. She squeezed her eyes shut.

"Ex-actly. Genius sh*t right! Bet you thought I didn't have it in me." She settled back in her chair, satisfied.

Doom doom bonged the air. Hollis felt the irrevocable destruction of hope starting in this room and working outwards. Wait for the question you know is coming.

Dorchester said, "Okay. Why are you here."

Yolanda took a few seconds to respond. She shrugged. "Texas."

"Are you inept? We left you behind on the road."

"An accident."

Dorchester leaned forward. "It wasn't."

Yolanda looked at her and then looked at Hollis. She laughed. "f*ck you, Dorchester. You always needed a sense of humor." She teetered slightly on the chair. "Are you telling me the Charleston Three is gonna be the Charleston Two? No way."

"That's how it is."

Yolanda pushed a hand into her hair. "Hollis," she said. "Help me here."

"I, uh," Hollis stammered. She stepped along the edge of the room to break line of sight. Yolanda's eyes followed. The thick refrigerator that came with the room gurgled obtusely.

Dorchester stood up. "Leave now. I'll keep my word today, if you try to follow us I will kill you."

When Yolanda stopped smiling she became greyly bureaucratic. She stood and straightened, topping out inches above Dorchester. Her jaw worked. She stepped out, jerked spasmodically, and slammed the door.

Thick strings released. Hollis swayed. She laughed dismally into her arm, looking at Ryatt and Dorchester in wonder. Dorchester had accumulated wrinkles and Ryatt still looked terrified but the faces were almost a comfort. Hollis brushed past Dorchester and slumped into the nearest chair, supporting her head in her hands.

A presence loomed. "She had something to track," said Dorchester.

So. Hollis shivered and dug out the decoy gem, presenting it in bent submission. "I'm sorry-"

Dorchester grabbed the gem, extended it to arm's length, and squeezed. Crunch-pop. Shards dribbled on the floor. "Is there anything else?"

Hollis shook her head.

"I don't trust her to have left, and her sloppiness may have attracted the USMF. If we have to escape again are we ready?"

That was the precise thing Hollis was not ready for. But she nodded.

"Good," said Dorchester, "Then we will leave." She went to the door and put her hand on the knob and the entire entryway burst into cherry red and became its constituent parts flying across the room.

Hollis spun right out of her chair, a splinter whacked into her shoulder and she toppled onto the floor scrabbling in grime as past the shriek of her buffeted ears raised popopop automatic fire. Dust jellified her eyes, needlepoints prodded every inch of skin. She clutched the chair until the bullets stopped and began to crawl, slapping her Gem to quickly transform, scraping until she unearthed a stiff cloth form (a horrifying burlap texture, Ryatt!) which she dragged over the choppy rubble until she found daylight. The gunfire started again, shifting position and angle. A man's voice bawled some nameless terror sound. Yolanda paced in the parking lot waving a machine gun like a nerf toy, shooting everywhere.

Hollis released Ryatt and skidded down the stairs. She toppled forward on the final few steps, hit the ground, and leapt up waving her hands, "Stop, what are you doing, stop!"

Yolanda swept the upper section of the motel, windows crashed. Hollis had no idea what to do next, so she just kept gesticulating and made cowardly circulations that finally generated a full retreat. Yolanda, noticing, stopped shooting long enough to give her a wink and a thumbs up.

"Oh sh*t oh sh*t," Hollis repeated. She peered for Dorchester but the girl could not be found. Hiding? Left in the apartment? Could Hollis have missed the scattered limbs?

I'll take care of her.

You're fine oh jesus. Listen do you know where she is, I'll help just tell me how. I'll do anything. Dorchester?

Awful snapping shots tore the void of no response. In the dips of paused gunfire and temporarily muffled screams you could hear the rasp of Yolanda's boots shifting amongst the cars.

Maintain distance. If Bedlowe has turned traitor you are the only one left. We will go together.

Hollis did not blink. Why? It meant nothing. Focus on the important details.

I will handle Bedlowe. You may watch.

Finally Hollis happened to look to the roof, and the figure there, the flapping robes, Dorchester never more regal, her hat a crown and her scroll raised for oration. Yolanda hefted her gun but instantly a whip-crack sonic snap somehow congealed the air to sludge. She faltered against the side of a car, discharging bullets into the pavement. The gun jumped out of her hands without weight, oozing in moon gravity even as Yolanda doubled over at normal speed.

"Let My Judgement Pass," Dorchester boomed, "Unadorned, and UNCONTESTED."

A spear of pure light two car lengths long split from the air itself. It hovered above Dorchester's raised scroll for a moment, humming in the sky, so vivid Hollis could barely look. Nothing moved for so long that Hollis began to worry she'd missed the critical point. Then the scroll pulsed, CRACK. The spear cut the distance in a half second or less and when it reached its destination at the point of collapsing Yolanda it erupted into a roar and a pulse of chalky retina-burning brightness. Hollis cringed, overtaken, but it fell back, the howling gale faltered, and the light died.

She opened her eyes. In the place where Yolanda had been was a perfect semisphere crater and a smattering of blood, so dry that it immediately began to flake off in tiny confetti bits that cartwheeled in the breeze. The neighboring cars fell, missing halves.

Dorchester hopped down from the roof. Hollis whispered her name.

"Yes." She shook herself. "It was not supposed to be so powerful."

Hollis stood there like an asshole. "Cubes," she finally said.

"Yes."

They went to the sedan, Dorchester slowly doddering, Hollis looking back to confirm her progress. "Ryatt," she called, and Ryatt gravitated like a timid dog.

Dorchester fell back and waited expectantly while Hollis dug around after the box, somehow tucked under the deeper reaches of the seat. She fished it out and rose from the car. Dorchester stood watching, craggy with harsh angles. She was brushing the hair out of her eyes, putting herself back together. Behind her was Yolanda.

"Uuh," said Hollis.

Yolanda with a gaping hole in her abdomen where the organs heaped and fell, almost circular like she'd had a hole punch taken to her. She grinned with tar teeth. Hollis jerked, "Uuh," she couldn't even make a different sound. Dorchester stared like what's wrong with this girl, what's her deal, as Yolanda moved smoothly forward and poked a silver blade through her chest.

She crumpled. Hollis ran around the car to find her contorted, choking in vomitous spasms, already awash with blood. Hollis still held the box and could do nothing with her hands.

Yolanda leaned down, uninhibited by her injury. She pawed over seizing Dorchester and plucked it out, an eggshell Gem Hollis had only seen a few times in her life, in vulnerable moments. Yolanda rubbed her thumb on it thoughtfully. She nosed Dorchester's head with the tip of her boot and mouthed words.

Hollis finally choked something out. "Nono Yolanda wait-"

Yolanda clenched. The fingers pressed down over seconds, the surface buckled, the silver filigree bent, Dorchester made an ungodly shriek, a drowned thing falling limp as the Gem warped and with a thin snap finally lost form. Yolanda inverted her hand and the mangled metal skeleton tinged on the ground. Dorchester stilled, her costume evaporated. Her t-shirt soaked with blood instantly.

Yolanda turned to Hollis.

Hollis said nothing.

Yolanda sighed. "I forgive you." She walked past Hollis, took the box from her willing hands, and whipped it into the parking lot in a shower of cubes. "Come on. We have places to be."

Hollis lost sight of her like a mirage. Alone with Dorchester. The face flamed purple. Foam in the corners of a pit mouth. She wasn't moving, but was that, maybe, a little hiss…

"Hollis, come on! I brought the minivan over special!"

Hollis moved stump-legged. Ryatt at the bottom of the stairs, Ryatt with the slate-eyed vacancy. It wouldn't be right to say anything, Hollis just grabbed her by the arm and pulled her towards Yolanda's voice. The screaming man finally became clear, bawling STOP IT again and again. Others emerged from doorways, a plain woman holding a vivisected arm, a baseball cap guy with large hands stumbling around on the upper section. Hollis and Ryatt drifted by a man in a black t-shirt depicting a large t-bone steak. He reached out to Hollis for deliverance - but his fingers only grazed her, and he resumed his limbo drift as she went on. The minivan appeared, looking exactly as destroyed as yesterday. Ryatt slipped into the backseat. Hollis sat beside Yolanda, who was driving. Yolanda motored around and passed the body, over which supplicants mulled. Look at her face!

They left. Outside the gas station men crowded, raising their phones. Wind roared in the windows. The sun screamed.

Don't construe it as shock. Hollis was not shocked. She was full of clarity. The only thing that had changed was her priority set, maybe her motive. The past and future were a whole lot of meaninglessness. Why exist outside the moment? She was in a car moving, that mattered, what else?

They entered deep woods again. The hole in Yolanda was beginning to reconstitute, the guts creeping in, the skin puckering and closing.How are you not dead,said Hollis.

I think it's God.

Okay.

Maybe not God directly. But it was possible to do such a thing because God arranged for a, an apparatus. While I was on the way I thought a lot and I guess it's real and on our side. You're right I shouldn't be alive but I am and that's divine confirmation, your usual logic falling apart. Pliability, that's the takeaway.

The road breezed. They were nowhere.

Don't think about it too hard.

Sure. Why bother? It was impossible to arrive at a conclusion when nothing ever made sense.

Just, do you ever feel like you're crazy? Or everything is. Well my theory is that our world is malleable. That's what we are right, we think sh*t up and our emotion is going to counter entropy or whatever. Like demigods or some sh*t. And that represents to me, nothing is definite. Think about all the Magical Girls right now, coming together, and tell me there's no effect.

If Yolanda kept talking Hollis was going to die.You killed Dorchester.

Hell yeah!Yolanda did a fist pump.And I knew I could too. She should have stepped off when she had the chance. No disrespect. But her or me. Game hasn't changed that much.

Are we still being hunted? Has that changed?

Probably not but you're the one who can check.

Hollis didn't want to check.

They won't last anyway. We just need to slip them now and watch this stack of cards fall apart. We'll slide right out and they won't have a f*cking clue, we'll be outlaws.

That's unlikely,chirped the voice, the annoying one. In the rearview mirror next to the Ryatt heap was Kyubey, sitting. Everyone here together.The outlaw phenomenon can hardly exist in a paradigm such as this. You'll inevitably be captured.

Hollis stared ahead.Nice warning Kyubey.

It was a calculated decision. My hope was that Miss Bedlowe and Miss Malecki would effectively eliminate each other, freeing you to act in a much less damaging fashion. Had it not been for certain events beyond the realm of expectation, I'm sure that you would currently be in a very favorable situation.

Hey Hollis,grinned Yolanda,what do you think that means. He doesn't f*cking know. Can he even do sh*t anymore?

Kyubey hopped up between the seats like a housecat.It's true that your survival, Miss Bedlowe, intrigues me - however, many such oddities have occurred before. The nature of Magical Girls lies in miraculous occurrences, as you know.

But too many miracles and what do you get?

This is strange, Miss Bedlowe. Your interest should lie in mere survival.

Yolanda shrugged.I'm surviving. More importantly, what are you hiding? It's not a good look, Kyubey. Haven't we caught on by now?

He sighed.It's always a shame to see a girl beyond rationality. Does this illustrate the danger of your situation, Miss Ames? How can you trust that she won't decide to eliminate you as well, when she's so erratic?

Not the same,said Yolanda,but a heartless rodent wouldn't get that.

My concerns are borne out by experience. How many people have you killed today? I believe it was five.He nuzzled Hollis' noodle arm.Miss Ames, you know you can't rely on her. Am I wrong in concluding that you don't agree with the elimination of Miss Malecki? By most human standards this would trigger either avoidance or revenge. Do you truly want neither?

Hollis grabbed for his little ear-thing and he wrangled out of her grip instantly.I just want to live. Step off huh?

The rat jumped to the backseat.But your life is in danger. Why were you able to recognize this when the risk was comparatively low, but now you deny it? You're sure to die by Miss Bedlowe or other means on your current course, but escape is not impossible. The very plan we discussed may still be on the table.

Hollis laughed. She reclined in her seat.

Do you not want to know about the plan, Miss Bedlowe?

Could you be any more transparent? Bitch Hollis is with me for life, you think your trifling sh*t can erode that you're wrong, we're together, a piece of this girl is in my motherf*cking soul. Sow discontent with the rookies asshole, we know you.

Hollis was letting it occur and it still wouldn't happen. If only they'd all realized before, that it just didn't f*cking matter.

Very well,said Kyubey,I can see I'm getting nowhere. You should do as you have, Miss Ames, and survive. I will do my best to aid you from my end should you choose to accept my help. I hope that both of you somehow come to your senses - the damage you've done so far is devastating, yet you may still avert total catastrophe if you cooperate.He vanished.

Yolanda immediately tapped Hollis on the shoulder.Nearest city?

Hollis checked.Statesboro. It's fifty miles. Why?

We'll probably lay low. I want to let the heat die down you know.

f*ck it. Hollis set the destination.

She did actually check the news. More articles. Shot up motel, dead suspect. Eyewitness interview of a woman Hollis never saw. The fugitives' vehicle had been lost. Keep an eye out for a RED HONDA, a RED HONDA.

A video with clips. Hollis watched it a one-armed girl holding an assault rifle, standing near the familiar minivan, looking inconceivably tired. Then the President said something at his fancy podium.

What do we think of Ryatt?

They were still miles out and the road was abrading Hollis. She sprawled in the seat like some structureless, withdrawing junkie. Pain, pain, it was Yolanda's gimmick after all, paralysis and severe waves of agony, about the closest a Magical Girl could dig to their human roots, sheer bodily distress, there's a death.

But the question confounded. Because it didn't matter? Due to the insignificance of the specimen. But it felt important to answer honestly…

She's okay.

She's a burden honestly. Look at her. She's asleep. Do you really plan to take her to Texas? I bet she'd shrivel up.

She can learn. She learns.

She dies more like. Maybe I kill her out of frustration? Seriously, f*ck this girl, she should get with the program. Yeah it sucks, not your ticket to f*cking snooze on us.

Why even try? Let her talk sh*t, she couldn't be stopped.

I vote we drop her. Hey, Ryatt!Hollis would have winced if she had muscles.Wake up motherf*cker we're talking about you!

Ryatt shifted with tectonic slowness. Raw eyes gouged the cave of her own body.

You vote we drop you by the road, let you free? You could just walk away. Go to the USMF and sign on, what about it? You'd probably be a f*cking legend. How about it?

I don't care.

Why don't you care,butted in Hollis.We talked about this.

I just don't. It's a trick right? I won't participate.

sh*t,chuckled Yolanda.Fungus girl acting the part. Sedentary ass.

Ryatt. What the hell. You're being offered freedom, isn't that what you want? Respect your f*cking self.

Ryatt was silent.

sh*t,said Hollis,I vote drop her. Stop.

Yolanda glanced briefly.Why.

You're right, she's not up for it, she'll wither like a goddamn plant, it's happening right now. I don't want her dragging down this clusterf*ck.

Well isn't that better?

What?

Yolanda shook her head.I change my vote. Let's keep her.

Hollis itched inside her f*cking skull.Okay Ryatt? Ryatt you f*cking vote, you join this sh*tty sh*t. Vote to f*cking escape. Moment of choice, you'll never get another chance.

Ryatt said nothing. Hollis gave up. She made the executive decision to give up. She tapped her foot.

Fifteen miles.

They arrived. More suburbs! Did smaller cities like Statesboro also have these? Kind of a cosmic constant manifesting around every population center, serving no less crucial a goal than as a gateway system, a coded transition zone, um, an enforced delineation?

Yolanda, getting in the mood, said she wanted a burger. Hollis felt no need to respond.

We've earned it, and it's even tactically useful because we need energy, let up on the Gems, you know? We'll both feel a lot better.

So let's go.

Well I'm asking where. This is our victory meal remember.

They passed a burned out car - the suburbs were degrading after all.Let's just go wherever. I don't even want anything.

Don't be a sadsack. Fine, I'll pick.

The wraiths multiplied, babbling in crowds among the houses. Statesboro was actually an unknown, feasibly it wasn't even habitable. Some cities just got eaten. And why try to reclaim, when they were still picking up the pieces in big names like Boston and Baltimore? For once it actually seemed possible that one might simply disappear into a false frontier - and they hadn't even left Georgia yet.

All fake though, because within minutes they entered another axis of the city and the wraiths evaporated and were replaced by nice cars and prosperity. Legions of flimsy lawn signs appeared on the shoulder: LOCAL MAGICAL GIRLS, U.S. MAGICAL FORCE. And what was this phantom, plastered on a passing bumper, USMF UNITE.

A ffff*cking sticker? Magical Girls unite, jesus. In what world.

They pulled into the drive-through of a random fast food joint and sat behind another car, a white pickup ordering at the monolith speaker.You want?said Yolanda.

Hollis looked in the rearview mirror. Already someone was pulling up behind, a pasty goblin behind the windshield.Nothing. Nothing ever.

The truck rolled forward, they came up to the speaker.I'm ordering the biggest thing here unless you give me something.

f*ck you.Hollis thumped her skull on the headrest.Small fries.

Yolanda leaned out the window. The speaker was silent but the beings inside had to make first contact. The moonface in the car behind leaned out of his side window and slipped back inside when he saw Hollis staring. Woah! Is that?

"May I take your order," crackled the speaker.

"Yeah that's uh, two double cheeseburgers and two large fries. And two large co*kes."

The speaker dispensed a price. The guy in the pickup truck, all the way up at the checkout window, was squinting in his side mirror, and didn't stop as they rolled up.f*ck are you trying to do,said Hollis.

Like I said, you're obviously in a bad way, it's for your own good. Get some money how about.

Hollis dug out a wallet and flicked a twenty at Yolanda. Surveilled on both ends. The wider area was way too open also, you could see from almost any direction. Yolanda wasn't even out of costume…

As they finally came up to the checkout window the cashier angled his phone in sweaty hands. Yolanda slid the twenty through the window and he dropped it, grabbing the money when she withdrew.

No more. They all knew. Hollis couldn't stand it. The moon in the car behind them staring, sh*t on that. She cracked her door and began to step out, "Get back in the car, f*cker!"

He retreated, shamed, but other cars piled up behind now rolled down their windows, squinting at the noise.

"You think I don't notice you assholes," called Hollis, becoming shrill, her face flaming. One of the doors popped open a hair and she screamed "No no no! f*ck you close that door right now, I swear to god! You already f*cking know you don't want to do this!"

The door closed and everybody stared through their windshields. Hollis fell back into her seat. Yolanda patted her on the shoulder. The guy opened the window and stuck out a paper bag. As Yolanda took it he mumbled, "The ones on TV."

"Yuh," said Yolanda.

"Well you should just know I'm on your side and all. I bet you had good reasons."

"Goddam, thank you very much. See Hollis, we're heroes."

Hollis held the bag, it rattled in her lap as they pulled into moderate traffic. Yolanda waved at the cashier, who shyly leaned out his window to check their passage.

Maybe Yolanda was fortunate enough to look at it that way. Her right. But this was firmly enemy territory, with or without the USMF crap. Fat ogling f*ckers everywhere, evaluating, scheming! Sure, fine. Watch the f*ckers. That's how you trounce them, you figure out what they're doing before they do it. Eyef*ck them until they lose their cool, make them guess a little bit, that's the ticket. Just enough to produce some time, time to figure it all down, tease out the source…

Tail,said Yolanda.

Hollis' cool shattered.What? Where?

Two cars back. Unmarked but lookit the light thing at the top of the windshield. And I think that's another one a little bit ahead.

sh*t. sh*t!

That's okay. It'll work out.

You, you brought us here!

Look, they're watching.Yolanda steered with one hand, reclining.They won't want to do sh*t now because it would look bad and uncool. We just need to make sure they can't go after us without collateral.Well, I've got an idea. It'll give us leverage, it'll keep us safe. I know how these f*ckers work now, you feel? Okay, bear with me.

Letting the silence hang. Whatever was coming was bad, why otherwise?

Walmart.

Hollis' soul twinged.You're saying.

We're going to Walmart. And we're gonna hold some folks, and we'll negotiate.

What an utter thought. Hollis struggled to wrap her mind around it.That's us cornered.

Like we can't talk them into a deal. In exchange for blah blah blah you can leave the city limits.

That doesn't even work in movies, Yolanda. So you don't have a plan. We're just screwed.

Tsk tsk.She said it like Tisk Tisk.Hollis of little faith. How about we think on it then. That's our backup plan. We'll see what else we can come up with.

Hollis shook it away. She thought she saw more hangers on, she picked out surveillance points. And people staring, but not acting, maybe not even aware that in seconds the peace could crumble. Undercover cars acting like it was normal. Hidden actors, specialists. Drifting toward deeper vessels…

She dug out one of the burgers and gnawed on it as a distraction, and as it settled stonelike into her stomach she kept checking. Checking everything, checking the road, and the cops, and herself. She said to Ryatt, with no preamble or goal in mind,Hey get ready.

What,said Ryatt.

Hollis fumbled.I just, we've got a situation, it might get bad soon. So be ready.

Ryatt didn't respond.

When all else failed she had no choice but to check her phone, and it told her, the closest Walmart within the limits of Statesboro was miles away, across the main breadth of the city. It was rated three and a half stars and usually pretty populated by this hour. In the time it would take to get there they could easily be intercepted - but they could just as easily make it.

The fantasy was so ridiculous and stupid. She never intended to commit to anything like it. Hollis brought up a map as though knowing the roads and streets might offer a solution. She racked her mind, never a real strategist but the odds were clear enough. They were probably trying for containment, meaning that the moment the minivan left the danger zone, i.e. Statesboro, the hammer came down. Even Hollis could think no further than hostage taking. When she realized her attempt at a solution had degenerated to scoping out more convenient locations she dropped the phone in disgust.

They couldn't do this sh*t. It was f*cking insane. It wouldn't work at all anyway.

What would we even do in there,she scoffed.How would we keep them from just running out the other doors?

These people are sheep, they do what you tell them. They just need to think they can't escape you dig? We trick them essentially. That's why we'd bring in some of the guns we've got here, as a show. People know how to act with guns.

Hah? Fantastic, great wisdom! They just know! Well, Yolanda was out of her gourd, she'd totally lost it. They wouldn't even be allowed to get there if the USMF had the slightest f*cking inkling of urgency and competence. Any alternative was better, there had to be an alternative!

They entered a traffic jam. Progress slowed to a crawl. Hollis counted the hot minutes, compressing under thickening air, swatting at flies that buzzed freely through the windows. Wandering eyes everywhere in their shiny bumper-to-bumper vehicles. Would you believe that the tiny city of Statesboro Georgia could support so many inquisitive minds? It seemed insane. Where did it all come from? Nobody actually lived here. Hollis hesitated to think - engineered? No, wouldn't make any f*cking sense, the whole point was to get them away from people…

Get down to it and she couldn't relax. The burger settled ill on her stomach, her surroundings mocked her. The Walmart thing was just barely setting in. The kind of thing crazy motherf*ckers did. Wikipedia iconic, historically pertinent. If the line existed it stood here, at the moment of premeditation. Never even would have been a f*cking problem before, there were good lean rules, pretty easy to follow: kill another Magical Girl, Kyubey sent a terminatrix, you had one or two enemies and if you survived maybe he left you alone. Sometimes real people died - the cost of the game. You bore it on your chest. Handled f*cking everything. No, let's not do that. Let's bring in the USMF - also made of murderers and felons, by the way - to figure it out on their own terms. And oh sh*t, how about the general population, too. Let them sweep their eyes over this, write f*cking articles. That is a fantastic idea.

Bastards, assclowns. What right did a single motherf*cker among them have to judge. When she'd always been dealing with her cards alone, no unnatural aspirations, just survival. Come and tell her she made the wrong choice. What choice?

Yolanda,she said,are we getting out of here ever?

If this f*cking traffic clears up haha.Yolanda winked quickly.Seriously we're good. Even if we don't do like I said. Miracles remember?

Hollis was just waiting to say her next line.I don't want this to be all there is.

Well it's pretty fun you have to admit.

No. Don't you understand? This is worse than DuPage. Is there anything at all that gives it a point?sh*t, how to communicate this.Look, it's like we're trapped here forever. And we've always gotta fight. It's just variations on misery. And I'm like, why bother anymore.

Yolanda shrugged.We're Magical Girls.

Yup.

Let me tell you something,said Yolanda.

No, you're right. Magical Girls, got it, I'm good.

No listen.Yolanda slapped the steering wheel.I'm your friend, Hollis, so take this for what it is. Easy as hell really.

Hollis watched her. The traffic opened up, they moved.

You just give up. If you think about it too much you go all sour, so you don't do that. You glide where it takes you, feel? Think like it's you getting pulled along on strings, drifting on down, here it comes, but no worries! That's just where you're meant to be.

Certainly seems to have done a lot for you.

Yolanda grinned.Happy as hell.

She was probably right.

Listen, I'll tell you another thing. You wanna know my wish? I promise it's related.

Once this had even been an object of curiosity. Ground down before they left Charleston.

Okay, here goes. It was these two boys. They hounded my ass, whatever. Threatening me. You wouldn't believe who I was back then, I just took it for the longest time. Never been treated like that. I'm thinking, I do wish these motherf*ckers weren't a problem anymore. And Kyubey comes along, and I say, damn, I guess I'd really like to see them suffer! Get a little bit of begging in there? I had lots of fantasies. And I was satisfied for a while after I did it, but it wore off, and then it got creepy. Did I do the right thing? Does anyone know?

No surprises here. All wishes were dumb, and of course an inveterate psychopath would have a gruesome one too, having a brand to maintain. As expected, despite her best attempts at eloquence, Yolanda could do nothing but spout bullsh*t. Turn it off, turn it off.

My point,said Yolanda,is that this was with me for a while. sh*t, I was worrying back in Charleston. All of it got f*cked up. And then that bitch Schuman said what she did, hell. But I started fighting, and I realized, f*ck it. It's fine. It's justified. I couldn't do it there but when I took that Gem, that girl who tried to kill you, it was a chance to confirm, and sh*t, man. Since then I've never felt better.

That sure is f*cking crazy,said Hollis.

Crazy is bullsh*t anyway. Crazy is what they call us. I bet they call you crazy. But they haven't killed anybody, so.

Hah, yeah. A more schizophrenic, psychopathic story there never was, and the lesson, what Hollis thought was the lesson, was so f*cking common. Just give up, huh? Pathetic - but it was true that Yolanda didn't seem to need her mind all that much...

In an act of cosmic validation, the front of Yolanda's head exploded out the back of her head. She sighed telepathically.Damn.

The crack came an instant later and it was this, not the blood and brains, that gave Hollis her senses and got her to duck. Something impacted her seat right around where her throat would have been, th-wap. Another bullet pocked Yolanda in the chest area, who continued to woozily steer. It was happening, holy sh*t right before her eyes, no preamble or anything?

Something thumped hard on the roof.I'll need you to handle that,said Yolanda.

What the f*ck? How! Her thing was dinky pistols, no point really, none at all…

But as a thing, a purple thing, a spectral hand! appeared at the top of the windshield she produced just such a pistol and let fly. Bullets hit, did nothing. Surprise! Another hand appeared, another. Hollis leaned forward, pressing the barrel closer, there had to be soft spots, the, the knuckle, the wrist?

Just in time for a hand to grab her wrist, wrench away the gun, and yank. She flew out of her seat with a cartilaginous pop, halfway out the windshield instantly, air blasting her face, fuuuuuck!

More hands grabbed her other arm, her hair, her robes. Finally they lifted her totally out, dangling her off the side.f*cking HELP MEshe howled at Yolanda, who was still relatively unmolested.

You're good!

Hollis convulsed with fury. The hands held her a moment longer, and let go.

As she hit the road she rolled. The momentum sunk into shattering various bones, slowing her. She got hold of herself, stumbled upright, and started running.

Hollis knew herself as a relatively bad runner, Magical Girl or no, but only in the purposeless state her life usually enmeshed with. Now, enervated with crushing rage and an immediate object, the balance shifted: her feet flew, didn't even touch the ground, she glided on a film of compressed air. Sirens fell short behind her, and meanwhile the minivan swooped near, with it the BITCH on the roof, some Vishnu looking ass with bright colors and feathers, smooth sculpted arms sprouting off her back like wings. She glanced as Hollis stuffed her hand in her bag and drew out a massive revolver, the crippling costs of which affected her none as she unloaded with precise aim.

The girl cringed, a dome of palms aligned to deflect the fire, but they jerked when bullets hit. Hollis, emboldened, made the final push, leapt, sheer levitation for two seconds, hit the back of the minivan, snagged an aerodynamic fin, and held close. The buildings were whipping by, the cops' flashing lights slipped behind pitifully.

She clambered onto the roof using the antenna as leverage. Hands girl was trying to slip back through the windshield. Nuh-uh. Hollis fired and again the shield came up. She couldn't get through at any angle, when she ran out of bullets the girl resumed, apparently not even intending to deal with her.

Hollis spat. Another gun, the hands reassembled. Immediately Hollis lurched across the roof and plowed into the shield, the hands withstood mostly but the barest opening formed so Hollis could stuff the barrel in and get a shot at the meat. A strangled curse, one of the arms batted the side of her head hard. Hollis stumbled back drooling.

Finally the girl faced her, bleeding at the shoulder. She pointed an actual hand.You! Surrender!

f*ck you!She charged again, shooting, barging through like a f*cking TRAIN.

Actually one of the hands snapped wide and backhanded her across the roof. She cringed, blasting as she could, but the hands deflected all. Her nose stuffed and began to dribble.

This isn't working,said Hands.If you give up we can guarantee you a fair chance!

Hollis bounced on her feet like a boxer. Her nose was pouring actually, sluicing all down the front of her robes. Something was broken in her face so her eye set weird. That was okay. It was just there to prove she didn't sh*t gold. Hollis knew that, and she knew what to do.Motherf*cker can't guarantee me sh*t.She juked left, she juked right. Horrible on a tiny roof but her feet kept themselves.

The hands girl watched warily.An agreement, how about that?

L-like a contract?

Call it what you want a thing you sign legally.

Hollis bounced with vigor.If ever I knew that one day a Magical Girl would be talking to me about a CONTRACT-

She signaled left but juked right and down, crashed into the roof, fired from below. Smooth as hell except her target saw all of it and just blocked the shots. Now that Hollis was close, the girl went ahead and lashed out again. But Hollis blocked it with her arm! Which the hand grabbed.

f*ck no no no. Hollis pulled fruitlessly, no escape she already knew this … but oh sh*t, she still had her gun! She pressed the barrel against her wrist. When she fired the bones shattered and the flesh tore and with a whirl and a twist she ripped through the remaining connective material, dancing back, perfect operation.

Jesus f*cking.Hands girl flicked the wreckage away.What's your problem? You think I'm gonna eat you, Ames?

Hollis spat vividly.I think you'll get your revenge if you can, and bitch, I don't think I'm willing to give you the chance.

Don't be so goddamn short sighted. You're putting yourself in danger. I don't even know how you're still moving, your Gem can't be in good shape if you're tearing off limbs. Back down and we can work something out.

f*ck this line.I know what side you're on.

Magical Girls.

Shut the hell up.

The girl stomped pitifully.Okay fine! We want you caught! Big f*cking whoop, is it worth dying?

You're the ones trying to f*cking kill-

The shock rattled through her chest. Blood like slime in the veins, instantly depressurized. Crrrack from an alien distance. Oh. The hands girl dropped into a linebacker sprint. Ooh.

With contact Hollis bounced in a further snapping of ribs. She lost the pistol. She sailed, she flailed. See the minivan recede again. The air thinly rushing. Really, just…

NO. Hollis twisted in the last instant, her feet hit the ground, her knees bent. She bounded. No intended direction except forward, forward she went, here came the minivan roaring back, and the wall of hands stood solemnly ready to intercept. But it became clear that Hollis did not have her terminus at that space. She was headed for right below, the tiny window in the hatchback, no real chance of hitting but let us just twist-

She slid halfway through. The edges caught her waist. No f*cking way she was losing this chance, she strained, scrabbled, still some glass in the frame slicing and snagging, but, but! She lurched, her waist popped through, at the very last second a hand snagged her foot but came away only with the boot as she tumbled in.

She gesticulated.SHOWS YOU BITCH.

Fingers probed the window. sh*t, f*ck. Cardboard and useless pistols and ammunition, but what happened to all the big sh*t? She tossed flotsam every which way, it bounced off the walls and returned to the pile to be hurled more violently.Yolanda where are the rifles!

Backseat.

Always something between Hollis and what she needed, feet pounding on the roof, oh f*cking christ. She squirmed over the seats and Ryatt, scrabbled for orientation, found a barrel and seized the attached rifle and aimed badly with her one hand at the fingers now creeping back into the windshield. She let off a burst and the gun went totally wild, spattering up across the roof. A few of the bullets made holes, the rest whanged around inside the car, one whacked off her forehead like a golfball, ah sh*t she swung wide, would have hit Yolanda except the magazine ended. But the hands slipped away. Thump on the roof. Fingers snagged the empty back doorframe and released. Nothing else.

Cool,said Yolanda.

Hollis clambered over Ryatt. She peeked out the door hole, looking up. A body crouched on the roof. It stood up partway, woozily paused, and slipped backwards onto the road.

She fell back on Ryatt and crawled between the front seats and carefully deposited herself next to Yolanda. The road howled at 150 MPH. No cars at all in the rearview mirror, or ahead. Bullet pocked Yolanda looked over, head oddly bulging.Good fight,she said.

That missing hand that didn't feel like it was coming back so soon. The heart, the ribs. The bloody nose. Look in the rearview, can you see her? Is it really over? Swallow the blood, there may be more work…

Unless you have any ideas. I think it's time.

See?

It soon became apparent that the cops had realized their actual destination. Cruisers slid onto the road, desperately lurching to intercept the minivan, failing each time. At one point a helicopter buzzed at a distance, pumped a series of useless bullets into the side of the minivan, and split off into the greying sky.

They don't have a f*cking clue,said Yolanda.Can't do sh*t.

Hollis' energy took them there. Who else's? Here was how she was useful - augmentation, magnification, concession. Nobody could do anything without her, without fantastic magical GPS. Legions of fools couldn't cope, they had to have an easy solution, and so she survived, and the only qualm she could possibly have about it was that she ended up carrying out their idiot designs. So no qualm. All she was really doing was getting sucked in along the prevailing current, no sin in that, it happened to everyone. The perennial right of the people: sit back, relax, come up with a cool take to tell God when it's all over.

No straight shot to Walmart so they were slower, swerving turns, near misses. Theoretically, they could still be intercepted. Did Statesboro PD have anything in store to avert catastrophe? A barricade perhaps? Yes! Fences, spike strips, hardware! And the fences battered into the sky, and the spike strips whirled behind like snakes. No ideas. Real people just didn't get it, they couldn't do fluidity, it really had to be a Magical Girl. Where were the Magical Girls? On their way, presumably. Too late.

Your destination has arrived,chimed the GPS.

Yolanda swerved. They skipped the side of the road tore through grass careened into a parking lot, down herringbone rows, cops clarifying at the entrances, this their remaining move, to secure the thing under threat rather than eliminate an immortal danger, except the danger was already here. They quailed when they saw. The final stretch the parked cars zipped by, looming tan shell, jump the curb and-

They burst through in a shower of concrete, soared, clipping register areas and spiraling debris and skidding finally into the shelves, multicolored goods bouncing through the windshield. Yolanda backed up viciously and right ahead was a human mass, barely organized by more grey officers, pressing outside.

The minivan roared into the parting crowd, Yolanda swerved just so, it slammed lengthwise into the doors and blocked them, cops danced and pulled out guns they didn't raise. Others chattered and congealed. Where to exit now?

Yolanda slouched out of her seat and leaning over Ryatt snatched a rifle. When she brought it up a sigh rolled in the multitude, and the people with guns, not all cops, did now point them. Shouting, goddamn noise. Yolanda cleared her throat ghoulishly.

All this expectation. It grows so big and what choice do you have? Hollis stepped around the minivan, dragging her own rifle. She stood beside Yolanda.

"On the ground, guys. In five."

Onetwothreefour-

Chapter 6: Aesthetically Pleasing Lifestyle Choice

Chapter Text

From the cash register vantage Hollis counted them. Men and women and a couple children huddled within an in-store McDonalds. Fourtyfourty-fivefifty. All humanity that still went to Walmart, strolling down product stuffed aisles, picking. They existed. It seemed that the superstore hellscape should have withered them away, but it had only become their home. Sure, and they were alive enough to glare. Hollis wouldn't sit near them. A certain amount of glassy air between her and those that hated her did wonders for coherence. Wasn't a Magical Girl's strength in separation?

Be right there,said Yolanda. Gunshots reverberated off of the roof. The people winced.

Hollis was bleeding was how they knew. A continuous river down her leg, oozing from one of the fatter tubes. One of us would die in minutes but see this girl hold her rifle and watch. It won't be that easy, they were saying. How they were looking at her.

Well, just wait and see. One new hole in her leg, one in her shoulder, and three in her chest. Both lungs tagged, so her useless body rasped and sputtered up stringy game constantly. Four brave enforcers could do no more, nor stop her from returning fire. They lay fatly near the minivan, bloodless. You never meant to hit anything specific, you just shot and got what you got, and what you got was sometimes good. It was a little tricky, but you could counter the recoil by firing in bursts and holding the stock tight to the shoulder. Then you pretty reliably hit center of mass.

Deep in the store the gunshots bounced and boomed and stopped.

The cops outside needed to know. Maybe they were also misinformed and thought if you fired enough bullets you would hit crucial organs. It would be fatal if they tried to bust in. Though, they were just having fun for now. Blaring their incredible collective siren. Possibly hundreds of cars altogether. Let them complain. Anybody had that right.

Yolanda strolled up from somewhere, draped in gore. She put a hand on Hollis' shoulder. This was always happening lately and it meant something but Hollis was tired.Got them good.Sheared 'em.Something fibrous remained on Hollis' shoulder when Yolanda let go.

If you asked, she never intended to kill anyone. It just happened that way, in the flow of the dream. Hopefully she wouldn't kill anymore.

Lemme look,said Yolanda, suddenly bustling along the minivan, peering through the windows.Ooh sh*t. I bet we're getting a bullhorn soon.

How are we negotiating.

Tell them f*ck themselves and let us go. Should I get Ryatt?

Ryatt barely existed. Ryatt could have been lost when they crashed through the Walmart and it would be more fortunate. If they let well enough alone maybe she'd evaporate, but Yolanda hauled the insubstantial bones out of the minivan of her own accord. You'd be forgiven for thinking they were both in early decomposition. Here, gestured Hollis. No, no, the registers.

Once deposited Ryatt sat there and gave the world a glassy eye that betrayed no cognition. Awful wincing idiocy, gone. Magical Girls gone over the limit disappeared totally, their phantom bodies were not left laying around for popular observation. Could be a lucky bullet had nagged her Gem. Hollis thought this over. No. See the ring. Ryatt was alive. A string of cotton candy was sturdier but the girl lived.

Hollis' bag suddenly vibrated. Alarm? T-timebomb…

Ah,said Yolanda, pointing.

No explosion. Buzzzzz. Hollis stuffed the rifle under her shoulder. She stuck her hand in and found a phone which she pulled out. "Hello."

"I am a Magical Girl."

"Then why are you calling me when you can telepathically link to my mind because you are a Magical Girl."

"It's better if we hash things out by voice."

Hollis felt spiteful. "You're not a Magical Girl."

Yes I am.

Then we'll talk like this.

"Let's talk like this."

Cheeky bitch. How to pull the bullsh*t apart without wasting time…so many questions like how was this girl calling a previously nonexistent phone? Unless she made it herself? Was that a thing you could do now, reach in and f*ck with a Magical Girl's magic?

f*ck it. How to begin a farce. "Okay. We've got hostages. You can guess why we've taken them. I'd like," she struggled not to choke on her own irony, "I'd like us to work something out."

"We can do that. Cubes?"

"Escape."

"Let's think smaller first."

Sure. No use pursuing Yolanda's Hollywood dream even longer. "Okay, let's see your line out there back up a little."

"Halfway down? We can do halfway down the parking lot."

"That's fine."

What's she doing,said Yolanda.

Hollis ignored her and peeked through the windows of the minivan. Indeed the police line was beginning to dismantle. Like in a movie, even. Magical Girls made certain pretensions possible, while the underlying logic fell apart.

"While they're moving back," said the negotiator girl, "Can you stay there? I'm just ahead of you a little bit to the left. Big black van."

The vehicle in question was something military, not even a SWAT van, taller and angular, USMF in white blocks on the side. Three unfamiliar girls were standing in front of it. One had a phone raised to her ear, labcoat thing going on, blacked spectacles so her eyes couldn't be seen. Dumb smile. She waved.

Hollis shivered. Oh, what was it. The juxtaposition. Smiling girl, matte black mono-block, ooh, something about it, the kid totally unaware of what moved in shadow behind her…but just wait, get in that van and then you'll see…

No, no. She didn't feel like talking on the phone anymore. A mind could wear so thin. Time to regroup.I want a guarantee of our escape. I want you to tell me that we can work something out where we drive out of here and are not pursued and we can go die where you don't have to see us.

Labcoat conferred with her buddies. "Well we can talk about that but you need to be patient so we can work it out."

I will die if I'm patient a single second longer.

"It feels that way, but I think you can admit you're being illogical. If you'll just let us come up with some cubes."

You won't listen.Hollis rubbed her eyes.I'm going to have to show you if you're going to learn.

She backed up from the minivan. The labcoat girl craned her neck. "Ames. You have to think."

Oh sure. Everyone does. You have to think, what's right? Your fault or mine? Better to kill with purpose, or by accident? Which makes you evil, you use them up and spit them out, or you bumble, bitch, and murder them all?

Grab someone,she told Yolanda.

Just brownian motion. Yolanda sauntered happily up and grabbed the nearest one, happened to be an older guy, someone's drooping barber. He began to blubber as she directed him to the minivan window for viewing.

Labcoat went halfway to shouting, poor girl. Magical Girls did not need to be fighting over things that actually mattered. "Calm down we'll talk but you need to calm down!"

Let's talk escape. What can you guarantee.

"Very little but we can work together! Listen. If you want to, I don't know, get a certain distance we can maybe do that but it's very delicate here. Just work with me-"

If you obfuscate I'm having this man shot in the leg.

"Listen," screamed the girl, "Listen to me I'm f*cking trying! Just listen! Listen! Listen!"

Hollis listened.

Someone's taking the phone,said Yolanda.

A new voice came on. "Hollis do not do a single thing more."

A circulating cast of characters was too much. Hollis tried to place the voice but it seemed dead and meaningless.I will f*cking eat him,she said.

"Don't be melodramatic. If anyone has an overriding survival urge it's you."

Melodramatic?Are you also incapable of getting-

"Stop posturing. Understand, you're outmatched, out of power, on the edge. You want a deal."

Talking f*cking OVER her. Hollis paced, hissing. She looked over Yolanda's shoulder through the minivan, oh right there's some alignment. Margarita kicking bitch, sure.

Too much to juggle, and only one end in sight. Hollis closed her eyes. There was a guy, and Yolanda, and the expectation.

"You want to escape? We'll arrange a car. Stay on the phone and we'll do it."

Yolanda,said Hollis,kneecap.

The rifle boomed. The man buckled and made a strange moan, held up by his collar, choking on it as the others in the McDonalds swayed like cornstalks. Yolanda heaved him back into view, streaking spittle from a puckered mouth.

"Stop," yelled storm girl, "We'll send a car to the entrance! Just hold on a moment? One moment."

Yolanda let the man sag a little bit. Kneecap hanging. Breathing and puffing and cursing. How this tiny guy could curse. Yolanda shook him a little.Hurry them up?

No.Hollis leaned into the cash registers like a toppling tree.It's going fine.

The bank robbery was just a fun thought experiment, cobbled together from disparate sources, polished Manhattan deal, dignified, plenty of room for people to run and hunker down. The story progresses in well aligned acts, bust the vault, aahh they're rappelling from the windows! When she moved to Charleston she had the occasion to actually enter a bank. A bland bureaucratic office, filled with crushes of people and filing cabinets. Impossible.

Same thing here. Walmart? The big box? No, all wrong. You just did not do it. If you did, it was a misalignment in the world itself, and you better be afraid.

The phone buzzed, twinkly ringtone. Hollis looked ahead. She hadn't heard the storm girl hang up but she brought it down from her ear to look at the screen. She recognized, barely, an emoji on white background. Voltage!

Haaah.

The explosion slapped her wheeling over the nearest cash register sans her remaining hand. Sharp points peppered the side of her body, bleeding incrementally. Her nerves twitched, returning to her, quitting that convulsion business.Sssh*t they're coming!said Yolanda.

Hmm. Hollis stood without theatrics. Spiralling through the windows of the minivan came a Magical Girl, tornado-style, three pronged landing and sprinting at Yolanda. Yolanda dropped the hostage and leaned into a barely subsonic clash, her rifle fell in half as new girl stumbled back with a knife in her throat, waving her huge medieval sword like a foam noodle, unable to prevent Yolanda from pitching the hunk receiver into her forehead. She keeled stiffly.

As Hollis left the registers the first few members of the crowd got to their feet and ran. She stood near the flow. Her stumps held nothing. Yolanda long-stepped over the foaming swordswoman, snagging Ryatt and dragging her into the registers. Hollis followed.We need a defensible position,said Yolanda.

Defensible from, uh, a hundred and how many voices? Or was that echo? Enough to wrangle a couple nasty apes, anyway. Wrangle them down to dust…

Something breezed overhead, wind-kissing the swollen side of Hollis' face. Deeper in the store burst a crackle of pale light. They ducked into the nearest cover, rows of lipstick and nail polish where the sound bounced louder off multifaceted glass walls. Yes, yes. The crowd was screaming! To be part of the escape, doors opening into light-

They turned a corner and onto a Magical Girl. She twitched and yanked back the string on her recurve bow and fired an arrow into Yolanda. Yolanda dropped Ryatt, whipped a knife, but the girl disappeared into thin air and it skidded down the floor. Yolanda ripped the arrow out of her chest.Sneaks.

She walked a step further and over a hoodie display soared the selfsame Magical Girl, bow ready. She fired point blank but Yolanda ducked and ran up arms spread for the BIG HUG, the girl vanished again and the same moment Yolanda altered course slightly, flinging herself, she whumped against invisible mass and tackled it down, stabbing long after the girl had reappeared…

Finally she stood. She'd also taken that second shot, through her eye, jutting out the meaty back of her skull. She grinned, grabbing Ryatt's limp body, beginning to drag.

I'll carry her.

How?

Hollis bent. Yolanda laughed and dumped Ryatt on her shoulders. They went.

Two more ambushes. Numero Uno was yet more brave new blood, distinguished by her stupid whip and the ardor with which she collapsed, heaving, when plugged in the chest. The second ambush came halfway across the store, at a huge inter-lane artery. From a side vessel poured five girls in military order, assembling into a straight line, vivid and simple, with dark eyes and silver weapons. The one in the middle dramatically fwished a rapier. "Surrender!"

Yolanda cast a span of knives, barely deflected by their respective targets, one got through and hit rapier kid square between the eyes. Gunfire broke from a girl with a multibarreled honeycomb pistol and another with a rifle, Yolanda took three hits and twirled in an acrobatic move that took her parabolically towards the nearest body,I've got this you go live,she jammed knife through trachea, the remaining girls continued to stab/shoot her.

Hollis slid into the nearest opening. She swayed precariously down the aisle of, what, candy? A knight descended from above, landed on graceful feet, plate armor clattering, woofing a big morning star.Don't resist.

I surrender.

The roar outside the aisle took on exotic tones, tinkling bells, ice. The knight ran a gauntlet over her forehead.Hand me your Gem then.

Hollis raised her stumps helplessly.

The knight was stock still a moment. She shoved past,Don't move,and went around the corner. Seconds later an airborne body zipped past, trailing blood as it went supersonic. Hollis left. When the echoes became a meaningless mash of sound she stopped, resting in an aisle of detergents, a clean smell to lay down and die in. The noise tapered into one shouting girl and then stopped entirely.

Yolanda appeared at the end of the aisle, looking like cranberry sauce in rags. She waved a bisected hand. When she continued Hollis followed her.We need to hole up,she said.

Really we should die,said Hollis.

Look what trying got, look what happened. The point of failure had to be spiritual. Born in sh*t, dragged in sh*t, naturally sh*t came wherever they went. Ooh, but Dallas, Dyson in the parking lot, is it possible, could it be?

They came up on a pair of bathrooms.Perfect,said Yolanda, ducking inside.

Nothing should touch the floor of a public bathroom but the bottom of a shoe. Only, Hollis was tired, and Ryatt was probably never becoming aware again anyway. So f*ck it, basically.

Near the sinks Yolanda bled continuously. In confines it was clear that she had gone torrential, punctured through her legs and neck and chest. It rolled brightly into a central steel drain. She hacked up deep black gobs.

Sick, said Hollis.

Yolanda waved.Nothing. Though I didn't count on this I won't lie. I kill them but they keep coming.

Mhm.It'll be over soon.

You're right. Sure. Miracles. I saw the proof and you did too.

Hollis smiled.

We just have to stick with it. Me and you. They can't kill us if we don't let them. Can't take us if we beat it back. We'll defy, Hollis, and we'll f*cking WIN.

Truly entertaining.I don't even have any hands.

I can fill in. And, are you sure? You're resourceful, that's something I respect a lot.

It took energy to go apesh*t. Hollis sighed. She was calm, actually. The grime didn't even bother anymore, a botched medical experiment vibe was fitting. And Ryatt right there, too. The peasant vole, ring still there, alive despite odds, barely even injured. Couldn't gather cubes for sh*t but Hollis would show her how to draw them out and pick them off with nothing more powerful than an enchanted .32 pistol. And then they'd go, and maybe get a stiff drink, and just talk for a while…

Hey,said Yolanda.

f*ck off.

Listen here, it's going to be okay, and you can count on that.I'll make it okay. I've realized I'm an agent of God two years late but now I'll do what I was put here for. I'll show these wayward girls what it is. I'll show you too. And we'll walk right out.

A Magical Girl had the right to delude herself. It would be cruel to deprive her of it.

Put it another way? God's not even sh*t. The connection is what matters. You know how I know? I was guided back to you. I had no guarantee that you'd take those gems. That's not just God. That's us.

Yolanda. I don't. f*cking. Get what you are saying.

Sure sure. You'll catch up. You're in a bad place. You'll see what I mean.

Hollis tapped the back of her head against the wall. How had it happened this way?

Well, goonies won't wait.Yolanda went to one of the stalls and kicked out the supporting legs, tore the side off, and hauled it to the entrance. She placed it halfway blocking the opening and held it there with a palm. Finally she stepped away, pushed the barrier, it stood solid. She popped her Gem out of her right arm and went to Hollis in two strides and dropped it in her lap.

I don't want it.

You have it. I'll fight them with my body and come back when it's safe. Just sit back.

Hollis stared. Yolanda pulled a cool thumbs up. Her drip-drained skin was cold and transparent like fish meat, what little remained on her lesioned surface. When she moved it was like a doll juttered by strings, probably not far from the truth either, the magic driving her. She was bullet punctured and slashed, burned and razed. Most of her brain had fallen out of her skull. No doubt, she'd live long enough to kill more Magical Girls.

She slid through the gap. The enchanted barrier shifted to fully cover the opening, hit, and sealed. The echo ran around the bathroom and fell into electric silence.

Kyubey appeared from behind the toilet in the mutilated stall. He padded through the blood untouched, settling down exactly where Yolanda had stood. He said nothing. On the first gunshot Hollis winced pathetically.

I had hoped for better judgment.

Sour, Kyubey?

Not at all. I consider it important to enlighten those who fall short as to the extent of their failure, so they can learn.

Hollis raised her stumps.I'm pretty aware.

This is a tired point, Miss Ames: you would have behaved differently. I don't hold your limitations against you, but you should know that others do.He licked his paw.In fact, public opinion has turned against Magical Girls at large. There's even talk of disbanding the USMF! Perhaps this illustrates the danger of self determination in your species - your biases and incomplete knowledge render you unable to make rational decisions. It's fortunate that there are balances.

The angle.

Very well. Surrender Miss Bedlowe's Gem and put yourself in custody, and I may be able to salvage what remains of the situation. I will present these events as evidence of the need for a more resilient structure in the USMF, along with new approaches for rogue Magical Girls. Temporary interference is inevitable but permanent damage may be avoided. Suffice to say that I can only make this approach if the conflict concludes quickly.

Hollis gathered the Gem closer.Who takes it,she said.

I will deliver it to the USMF.He padded closer and the weird alien hatch on his back popped open.Hurry, before she puts any more Magical Girls in danger.

Hollis leered. She stuck one of her stumps into her bag.

What are you doing, Miss Ames? Do you not intend to follow my advice? Understand that I will make no attempt to protect you if you squander this opportunity.

She drew from her bag what she wanted.Wouldn't let you touch a f*cking Gem if-

Kyubey expanded from near standstill to airborne, sailed through the air, and hit Hollis' arm scrabbling for purchase. Hollis, laughing, flung him back like a pillow. He landed on his feet and circled for another pass but scampered away as Hollis pointed her other arm, which had accumulated a simple mechanical hand and a small pistol. He vanished behind a toilet.

Hollis lowered the Gem to the ground and stood up, swaying with black grief. She stared at the Gem. During Kyubey's prattle she'd tuned it out - clattering automatic fire, explosions and impacts. The bullets entered Yolanda's body and did not measurably darken the surface of her Gem.

Hollis aimed the pistol. She blinked. She aimed the pistol.

Don't!said Kyubey. At the same moment the back wall detonated, a blurred form zipped through, Hollis-

The lights flicked out with a sound like snapping bone, and the walls rumbled down around her.

One video takes place in the parking lot, amidst the freed captives. They breathe air again, gormless, cave-dweller naked in midday. Heavily armored policemen herd incompetently, TURN OFF YOUR PHONES, TURN THEM OFF. Well, the cameraman drops the view but raises it again in seconds, turned reverse to the superstore, great beige platform. Gunshots are audible. Then they stop.

The cops haven't noticed, and maybe nobody has. Heads shuttle past quickly, very few looking back. Presumably, only our camera sees the air above the building darken. In the tall windows shadows assume specificity. Sour fog puffs through the jammed open entrance and consumes it as the camera descends. For the remaining ten seconds there are no visuals. Air howls, people begin to scream, and what must be a thousand wraiths synthesize into a booming carillon…

Beneath the rubble, Hollis wasn't dead. Only a little pinned. Limbs accounted for, bones shattered inside the meat, lungs subjugated with dust. Did she have a skull? Her head felt soft. Couldn't move, what's this, a spinal issue, pretzelification? Oh yes. And more.

Disturbances above, settling rubble.

You had to take stock. Hollis had nothing in particular to her name and little to be proud of. She was a discredit to her kind. Which she accepted. She took it into her arms now that nothing mattered anymore. Yolanda dead, all accounts settled. Maybe just a matter of time until the remaining issue resolved itself.

The noises continued. Sure was a lot of movement. Rocks scrabbling away like, like something alive. A rotten milk pungency oozed faintly in undercurrent. Did she just fade nicely or were there visions or what? The line had to be close, if not…

A big hunk heaved and clattered down an unseen slope. Cool air wafted over Hollis' scabbed face. She watched the darkness from the corner of her eye, unable to turn her head. From the invisible hole came a good old hungry muuuuhhhh. Hollis twitched her bones, work, yes MOVE. If she could get to her bag, oh just maybe, but her fingers snagged, ahahaaa! The wraith worked faster, cascading gravel, avidly groaning right in her ear, she convulsed and gnawed the concrete, a bitter death from some divergence she could analyze even as a crone hand clambered along her leg, up, up her chest and neck, as the ragged form followed in bonelessly filling all space, skin-to-skin rubberized muslin rot, oh she went fully batsh*t, the elongated maw came to rest alongside hers gabbing and widening for the consummation-

An explosive flash. The first light she'd seen in years. It was neon electric, and it came with a zip that cut the restless hiss of the wraith as it writhed from the hole. Zzzip again as it was halfway out, poof, just vapor.

Hollis gasped in her hole. She curled up what little she could, ice cold, convulsive. A soft blue light appeared in the opening. The tiny crucible of a Gem. The face beside it, yes.

"You," said storm girl.

"f*ck you."

The face vanished. Invisible arms lifted Hollis out of the hole. She stumbled miserably and finally gained her feet in time for hands to dart at her waist and snatch her Gem. She could barely see anything except for two Gems, blue storm girl and orange someone, and the dim wreckage from which she'd been extracted. Despite the bathroom theoretically being directly against the perimeter of the building, no sign of sunlight touched the ruins. All around were shelves, but somehow bigger, taller…

"Wait," croaked Hollis, remembering. "There's another one in there."

It was dark, so powerfully so that when the electric light descended into the hole the other Gem was nearly consumed, a pinprick hovering as all detail evaporated. Storm girl returned quickly. The face turned away and moved into the distance. "Aren't we getting her," said Hollis.

"I have the Gem. It will have to suffice, her body is stuck. We will move."

They were leaving. Hollis, muttering, followed. There seemed to be a slight incline. She was tired and heavy and hopelessly confused. "Look," she pleaded, "What's going on?"

The grade grew sharper and she pushed up it, stumbling, baffled. The ground eased up. They stopped wordlessly. The sour milk stench was stronger. The blue light raised up into the air and pulsed, light flushed in a cone, flickering searchlight pattern unable to cut the deep shadows, three dimensional torment. A wide path cut through a forest of mangled shelves, slimily reflective with white discharge. In the center, hunched gremlin-like, was a body. The face had been skinned. Vivid white teeth. Everything else appeared to have sustained only vague sogginess but, thenose…

In the backwash her captors appeared. The unknown, a kid with a bolt action Mauser, raised stock to shoulder and fired. The body detonated in a gout of flame. Blackboard shrieks floated out of the splashing inferno, vague forms twisting and ebbing like cyclones.

This setup. This demented environment.I don't understand,she said, glancing for friendly eyes, so alone, now she really felt the chill, her head pounded like hell, she didn't even want to consider.Is it that Yolanda killed Magical Girls?

In a just world,said storm girl.

What does that mean!

You would be the one to know, Ames.She stepped into the path, followed by the rifle girl, followed by Hollis. Muck slopped beneath their feet, untouched by the conflagration. The storm girl came up to the cremated remains, bent, sifted. She drew out a few sections of golden cage and tucked them into her coat.

I haven't done anything,said Hollis. Only what I had to.

It was you then. That fits.

It wasn't sh*t me, Archon my ass.But Hollis hung stripped of energy, following deeper down the path, clamped by shelves. Moans began behind, the rifle girl shot a larger wraith that got too close. It erupted into a huge greasy candle, waving and howling, collapsing to nothing.

Chapter 7: Eloaios

Chapter Text

Well. Scale was variable, visibility awful, sour mists drifted everywhere, wraiths too. The cereal boxes on the shelves were transmuted to wet cartons, swirling with Germanic scrawl. Sure, strong miasma, sprung from nowhere, had an internal logic, turned you around and around. Some alarm bells - but, Archon? Before Washington got all goopy weird and the T.V. went sh*tty Hollis had only heard one mention of that word, a mass death event in Minneapolis, a tornado supposedly. Such magical bullsh*t only happened to people with tons of Kyubey's ethereal "potential", probably under some kind of special condition, no way Hollis would ever have to worry about THAT…

But. Normal miasmas ended. This one didn't, or wasn't. Wraiths abounding, getting creative. Dug up some questions.

She asked the storm girl.What the f*ck did Yolanda do to deserve this.

Maybe she was your friend.

Why does that matter, friend.

Storm girl was silent. A vague form, the rifle girl, loitered into Hollis' general space.An Archon is usually generated by some form of betrayal between Magical Girls.

Hollis sneered.Good thing she wasn't my friend, and I didn't betray anyone. And save the f*cking lecture, I didn't ask you, goon.

I understand that you're stressed,said the storm girl,but if you keep being incorrigible I'm going to be forced to leave you behind.

Oh nooooo!Let the wraiths eat me, let it f*cking end, the hell do you care?

Hollis didn't actually want to be left behind. She wasn't sure why she said she did. Did she even particularly hate these girls? Only in theory. Even the storm girl, what was her goddamn name.

Stop,said the nameless girl. They stopped. A rapid clicking trailed above. Hollis was convinced whatever it was had gone when the rifle banged and napalm splashed over some gargantuan bird-creature on the upper shelves. It squealed and took meteoric flight, soaring into night, soon extinguished. Another shot, in the distance more flame and a descent. They started moving again, slushing, the muck deeper, arresting Hollis' feet.

What do you even mean by betrayal, why would that do this. Don't say sh*t then not explain. Betrayal seems arbitrary as hell, what decides?

God,said storm girl.

Hollis bit her lip.Why does everybody f*ck with me. God.

That's our understanding. Don't call her God. She's a very powerful Magical Girl. We don't know much more.

Violent pressure banged in her eyes.Why am I hearing about it now? Is there evidence? Since when was there real evidence for this whoodoo sh*t?

Since DuPage. Your fault if you didn't seek out the knowledge.

Hollis collapsed in despair. She couldn't collapse so she just slumped along inexorably in the wake. They wouldn't stop moving. Why couldn't they stop moving?

Make it align. ""God"" decided what made an Archon. Yolonda has killed USMF girls, would that constitute a betrayal towards their kind? No, that happened all the time. Could a USMF girl have hit among the ranks, accidentally? Oh, or just a lie - they had to be talking constantly in secretive little telepathic asides, excluding her totally, how could you even really trust you know, just look at that perfect synchronization, though there were fewer wraiths for it to whet on, mostly unseen, an occasional moan slicing to whisper.

Better pick them out while they still make sense. Storm girl in her silver furs, rifle girl with a hard military jacket and swooping coattails, a pudgy face. No real animation in either of them. Alignment of necessity, of simply not caring, that was familiar, the Charleston Three had operated like that once. Too far away now to compare, though, too decayed. Even Ryatt was gone. Strip away everything, what remained? No mirror, you have to float out your eyes and turn them back, then you realize, it's, it's slightly warped…

Hollis always had other people do the hunting for her, once upon a time vassals, more recently Yolanda. Before Charleston she'd entered a big one in sheer desperation, nearly died, and learned. That experience suggested the miasma had to be taking them somewhere, even if deeper into the core. Continuity preserved itself, scenery changed, and illusions were just that - but here, it looked a lot like they were walking down the same five aisles again and again. Though increasingly demonic. The floor tiles crackled and slipped into uneven muck, the shelves sank and bent torturously into hideous angles, toppling their merchandise. A certain box hit Hollis' shoulder, knocked her over into the hungry rust-razor shelves. In a moment of whimsy she attempted to punt the box, which turned out to be filled with concrete. She spat wildly, dragging her broken foot after the USMF girls.

At the next crossroads they stopped and waited for her. Storm girl sized her up without pretense. The bitch just didn't emote. Hollis glared as she caught her breath.

I need both of you to know,said storm girl,that we're at a certain point. I'd hoped to reach an exit before the miasma cemented itself. It's fair to say we'll have a harder time from here on out.

The rifle girl nodded. Hollis tried to parse.So we're stuck.

The miasma will attempt to keep us here. Now that it's settled it may become more aggressive. We're likely to encounter the Archon itself. I believe it's distracted currently, but it will get to us soon. In that event we can only pray for a particularly weak manifestation.

As they went on the aisle did another undulation, widening conically until the shelves split away into nil. With as much warning as ever rifle girl belted off a shot directly ahead. A clump of wraiths burst into howling flames, along with a hundred-plus that were illuminated but otherwise untouched. Hollis quailed, it just kept happening, couldn't it stop eventually?

Stay back Ames,said the storm girl.

Hollis was happy with nothing less. She backed away as the two USMF girls waded forth slinging electricity and tracer lead, she looked for something to hide behind, only finding her own monolith mediocrity. The seething ranks tore apart, rapidly falling to dregs. Storm girl zapped stragglers while rifle girl looked over her shoulder at Hollis, turning to retrieve her.

It was increasingly clear, yes. As a cursed organism Hollis could do nothing but parasitize, she was doomed to that fate, her own choice, the smartest decision available at the time, and nothing she would ever dream of rolling back. Steeped in murk she lived, and steadily went blind. No other option remained for her now, while these idiots cavorted around brandishing their useless power, feeling it, loving it...while Hollis had nothing but crumbs...

The rifle girl stopped suddenly and raised her gun. Hollis stared. A new thing coming to her. She began to move but too late, the rifle banged, the bullet streaked out, it winged past her. Thunk and a cartilaginous pop-pop-pop. Hollis looked over her shoulder just in time to see a hand, a pale and white and three times her size, ascend into the darkness with a flaming hole in its palm.

She stumbled, peered, neck cracking at a vertical angle. The rifle girl approached, gun slung, pasty and grim.You need to be careful.

Hollis smirked in her face.That's the Archon.

Most likely.

Why does it look like that. Why would it take that form.

You'd know more.

Hollis had been itching for this, she didn't know it until now.I would? Would I ever? From the beginning I've been totally clueless to this sh*t, I've been bouncing around like a goddamn pinball helpless to the esoteric rules of this hellworld.

Rifle girl shrugged.

Don't assume sh*t.She pushed past. Rifle girl crunched after her. Storm girl was ready for both of them and started out as they approached.

Hollis fell behind again. Of course she did. She barely had f*cking legs.

Oh, a few more wraiths. The passages narrowed and zagged, and you better believe in ghouls around every corner. Not just fodder either, insectile bipeds, granite strongmen, pulsing nightcrawlers out of the ground itself. The USMF girls could protect themselves, but Hollis, uh. One of the bugmen came up from behind, almost sliced off her head, barely zapped in time. The worms slipped into her boots, and when she stomped them they exploded into corrosive bile, slosh-sliding within as her feet began to bubble…

It seemed some boundary had irreversibly cracked. Things passed her lips that she had no memory of thinking.I bet you're happy with this sh*t,she said to rifle girl, who appeared if anything baffled. Black thoughts about her birth, her fate from the beginning. She could just explode with rage. Interrogation of a captured stray, Hollis as part of the show offered Yolanda some tequila, Yolanda snubbed it, BITCH. Equally inexplicable were opposite extremes. At one point she held back tears at the thought of Dorchester, stark outside the motel. Even more cloying, Ryatt, she couldn't get Ryatt out of her head, that body laying limp under the rubble made her want to rip her hair out.

In rare grace periods she lapsed into silence. At others she latched onto a conversational tone that felt like needles in her veins. She asked the names and learned them, storm girl = Marin Laguerre, rifle girl = Bradlee Higgins.Laguerre,she snorted, and felt momentary endearment.

Thirty minutes or three hours later she vacillated into sheer malice. She shambled, blood swilling from her boots, until she was close.Laguerre. How many.How many did Yolanda kill.

I'm unsure.

I wonder how she managed it?

So do I.

At the next clog of wraiths - the millionth - Hollis sulked along the shelves, now wavering gothic structures with gruel covered jars as merchandise. She shook so much she couldn't really see. Maggots drooling over her boots from the goo mud, going up her legs, burrowing in the skin, popping there…! She panted and began to bat them off, moaning, they stuck to her clothes, and all at once the mania ended, she slumped against the shelves, which cut her.

Ames,said Laguerre.

Hollis shuffled off to follow. She no longer possessed the tendons necessary to articulate her feet and so moved in stiff-legged seasickness.You're not even human,she said.You don't react.

They were silent.

Let's see what we've learned: you can kill wraiths but not Magical Girls, you die like ants, you can't emote, can't put together a good strategy, can't do your supposed job, have to rely on the f*cking rat for help, to which you are a gaggle of stooges, and can't do anything even then. My question is, why? Is it just the lowest denomination that goes to the USMF? Are you actually bad clones?

This is sad,said Higgins.

f*ck you. You're sad.Hollis spat.You're the saddest motherf*ckers I ever saw!

They turned. Laguerre had her staff lit up bright, nearly blinding.Calm down,she said.

Coupla bargain bin bitches.

This fragility,said Higgins.

Hollis loped forward. Higgins stepped to meet her and pushed her in the chest. Hollis reeled, almost fell, salivated with rage.You made me! You made me do it, I didn't have a choice!

Pity yourself some more.

Pity,Hollis sputtered.You come after me all the way to Savannah, I'm stuck in this world with you people, you psychopaths, and you step up like hot sh*t ready to shove me down, kill me, crush me, and, and all I ever did was the best I could, yeah yeah yeah and you act like I'm responsible, oh I f*cked up, well I'll say the same to you bitch, you f*cked up, you continue to f*ck up, you will forever f*ck up. You f*ck, you f*ckUP f*ck.

Laguerre stared at Hollis, who had her arms spread, had been gesticulating with the stumps, and now stood wide and wavering, ears pounding - she wasn't even sure what she'd said. Anything? She blinked rapidly, trying to clear it all up, suspicious that if she focused hard she would be transported away. Everything decayed so nightmarishly, but dreams ended.

We're done, said Laguerre.

No, well, the nightmare led back inside. That must be it. An endemic corruption, nothing real but the center, extending multifarious figments that will tell you how, and how soon, and possibly why, but that only as the event horizon manifests and you are crossing over do you see how you could have avoided it, far too late now, crossing over, do you seeeeee…

A battle at an intersection. They, the wraiths, were seething. Hollis thought of distant candleboats on a long plane of dark ocean. She wandered in a circle at the precipice and watched. Something had gone wrong, the boats were burning.

How many repetitions? Sometimes miasmas expanded time. Eyeswell, fatigue, days of expenditure. Laguerre and Higgins didn't look it though, which twinged a deep chord. If she got closer to them there might be signs.

Laguerre didn't even turn, just saidStay back Ames, it's dangerous.

Hollis stopped immediately. She was, hm, pretty close, just about behind them. How that happen?

A granite muscleman with cricket bat slabs for hands hurtled out of the firestorm, leading a whole crusher pack of similar friends. Laguerre and whatshername opened up into pyrotechnic fusillade. The whole outer shell collapsed, gridiron abs and huge baldie skullcaps shattered to spiraling chunks, crushed underfoot by the remaining formation which instantly doubled speed, the situation had changed, Hollis in factahead of the retreating USMF front,and as leading ogre lost an arm to a thunderbolt it bounded, the remaining bludgeon swooping-

She skidded in a furrow of sodden mud, draped in spaghettiworms. She no longer had anything below her ankles. It had literally blasted her out of her boots. Twinkling lights, Laguerre airborne coming off the shelves, Higgins a flash into nowhere. Musclemen clambered up the shelves after Laguerre, others HUT HUT sprinted down the aisle, disintegrating lesser wraiths in their path. The last one, armless, stalked towards Hollis.

Something rustled in her ear, she batted it and a worm burst and ran down the canals of her head, the inside of her brain instantly combusted, and big guy already, looming, stepping astride on the downstrokewoop. She cringed, the strike crashedwithin inches and cool rot splashed over her as she fumbled for footing on no feet. The strongman, absent a need to recover, swung a heavy uppercut into her chin and neck. Her neck popped at multiple points and her jaw collapsed. She flew banging against a line of monolith shelves, twirled along them, and schlopped back into the mud. On her elbows she watched the wraith approach, perfect movements, trunk legs flexing.

She got up. Somehow. Stump into bag, let's see what we have, oooho, nice great cool pistol, diameter smaller than a little finger, let's see how it goes! Well, one lucky shot put a chink in the smooth pectoral muscle, yeah, and the wraith started to sprint.

Blastoff. Those points of light, they were STARS. Nothing nothingnothing-

She hit the ground and scrabbled like a monkey through the aisle, gogogo just flying, splashing stomp stomp behind her oh, you thought, you f*cking believed! She twirled at the last second raising her arm no pistol? But a huge rifle barrel three quarters her natural height and when she fired her arm popped out of joint. The entire upper section of the wraith shattered. The lonely legs took a knee.

She. She fired again. Poof. Cubes flying.

Here's some sound now, some audience thing, clump of dusty monks in the shadows, laughing? Not just your typical moaning, a, a hissy cartoongyuhuhuhu. She waded towards them. She fired and a line of them died and the rest amassed circularly. They pulled off pieces of her as she killed them, batch by batch.

She was blind in one eye. She felt the left half of her face curdling off in clumps. She drooled blood in a torrent, more blood than a human body held. She was creating it from magic…

Ames,said Laguerre.

The same aisle as ever needed to be traversed and to do that she had to put one foot in front of the other.

Ames, where are you?

These were words, yes.

We've lost track of you, Ames. Are you still alright? It's important you respond.

I'm fine,she said.

We'll try to reconnect. What do you see?

Shelves.

Tell us if that changes.

Okay.

So mangled now, they towered like buildings, but the layout was identical. You passed down an aisle and came to a crossroads and had the option of going straight or left or right, and no matter what you chose, you'd end up in exactly the same aisle, with identical chuckling scabby things in the shelves and solemn spirits manifesting from the darkness ahead.

The wraiths were becoming less of a concern. One activity she wasn't horrible at, actually. Maybe the reason she'd failed so spectacularly in previous hunts was having somewhere to go. Other Magical Girls thrived on the wide world but Hollis was broken in ways that made her happy only when directed towards unambiguity. Or not unhappy. Call it anesthetized.

In one passageway Hollis heard from the ceiling a series of wet pops. When a balled fist distended from the upper void into the space before her she immediately raised her arm and blasted. The hand spasmed open, hit in the wrist, a cavernous blow that nearly detached it from sinewy multi-jointed mother arm. It jittered back into the atmosphere like a bad theater prop.

Hollis stepped forward. Her leg bumped into something soft. She looked down.

A mound. Like an outgrowth from the opaque slurry-mud, coated in the ubiquitous sour of this place and crawling with worms that nosed in and out of holes and tears. It had almost no cohesion save for the caved in, rubberized head of Ryatt.

Hollis stared. She felt bile in her throat. Had she forgotten? Weak and useless Ryatt, never going to be anything more than dead weight. Things being as they were, hadn't Hollis destroyed her? Failed her so that even as her hands were untouched the killing blow landed? And the worms crawled around inside…

Hollis wiped her blood-slimy mouth with the most soiled, soggy sleeve in the world. Closer inspection revealed more structure, destroyed arms and bones poking like beetle infested branches. It was half a body, yes, some small structure. She could do one thing. She gathered the heap and swung it around her neck like an old coat. Worms dripped onto her shoulders and in her hair and wherever they landed they burrowed and died. She shuffled down the aisle.

A strongman skulked at the crossroads like a nervy dealer. She blasted it to pieces. An arm fell off Ryatt's corpse and pattered in the mud.

Are you still there,said Laguerre,we're trying to find you.

I've got Ryatt,said Hollis.

She emerged from an aisle into an expanse of clothing. The stands from which it hung were rusty hooks and the material itself not fabric but leather which seemed to sweat and rustle autonomously. It stuck to her like vinyl, threatening to grab the decaying hump off of her back, far more extensive than the original, acres of meat sweaters, but Hollis had barely enough time to settle into blank progression before this landscape also opened up into a wide, blandly lit space and an antiseptic smell. Shiny checkout lanes and registers extended infinitely in both directions under an inoffensive white ceiling. Cool downdraft. She looked back. The clothes were gone. Nothing but fade to dark.

She shuffled. The floor was level, relatively clean tile on which her liquified gait served badly, fleshnubs slipping. She heaved through a lane with a happy ding from the register. The storefront, hugeified. The shops. A Vision Center. Customer Service. McDonalds. They were all clean. No hole. Sterilizing hard lights beat everything except Hollis clean. Ryatt disintegrated faster.

She came on a cardboard figure of a grinning Walmart greeter man and nearby sliding automatic doors, shadowy and grim. Hovering nearby, Laguerre and Higgins. Higgins looked. She raised her rifle. She lowered it. "Ames. sh*t."

"Good to see you," said Laguerre.

Yeah.Hollis wiped a hank of ick hair out of her eyes. It fell off.

"Are you okay," Laguerre said.

I'm fine.

Laguerre smiled. Apparently Hollis wasn't conscious enough to understand it. Magical Girls got beyond a certain point and became delirious. Was Hollis delirious? She hadn't thought so. She felt cool and calm enough now.

"Well," said Laguerre, "it's fortunate you came up. We were just discussing what to do. You'll notice the darkness."

Behind the sliding doors was an interminable void. There might not even be floor out there.So no escape here.

"Possibly. Obviously the miasma is guiding us, which means a trap. The question is, should we defy it, or go on?"

"I think," said Higgins, moments off cue, carefully loud, "we might could find other avenues."

Laguerre cleared her throat. "Which is fair, except the longer we spend here the more the Archon can solidify itself."

Higgins shrugged and looked at her feet.

"I guess you're tiebreaker, Ames. If you have any preference at all."

Hollis searched her heart.Let's just f*cking go.

"Is that okay Higgins?"

"Sure," said Higgins.

Laguerre clapped her hands tightly, Higgins jumped. "Then. Before that. Not to be too blunt but you look like you could use a rest."

Hollis swayed.I'm absolutely fine.

For a slight pause Laguerre looked entirely nondescript. "We have cubes to spare. We don't want you unstable. Are you certain?"

Hollis' head was starting to hurt again. She narrowed her eyes.I won't die, and if I did I'd probably be happier. Let's go.

Laguerre nodded. "Okay. Then we'll go. Higgins?"

"Sure."

"Then we'll go." She stepped in front of the doors, which slid apart coolly. No puff or draft, just dead air. "All at once," she gestured.

Hollis loped over. Higgins picked nervously into a spot beside her. They stood there for an awkward moment and Laguerre said, "Now."

Hollis stepped forward, attempting to match the step of the rest of them, maybe surpass them in violence and vigor, but imagine the horror when she fell over face first instead. Her nose popped right on the open doorframe and she was sure what had happened was a prime gaffe, haha NO-FEET. But unaccounted for were the hot sparklers in her limbs, schizodancing her to helplessness. Hands dragged her back from the edge and pulled her arms behind her back. She realized - they'd f*cking zapped her. She tried to buck the grip and kind of twitched a little harder.

Calm down,said Laguerre in her head,it's okay, you'll be fine.

Hollis gurgled. They wanted to kill her, USMF, of course. Bastards. Bastards. She'd never get Ryatt out of here if they killed her, so, how about-

SAM missile howl and her arm kersnapped. "sh*t!" screamed Higgins. The hands fled, she twisted and crawled and took a boot to the side, rolling into a wall where she lay gormless until zapped again. Higgins descended, "Motherf*ckER," she edged in another good kick and resecured Hollis' arms. Hollis failed to resist as Higgins prised out her Gem. Did she really want anything more than peaceful oblivion?

Instead some kind of drugged haze came over her. Not even pleasurable, just dull. The pain, which had banged naturally and loudly, eased to a light sensation, like itching. Higgins above her muttered vividly.

"Ames," said Laguerre eventually, "your Gem isn't getting lighter."

It shouldn't,said Hollis.

"Try to be more positive."

Hollis tried.

"It's not working. Have you done something? Be level."

I've been really f*cking sad lately. Are you doing cubes?

"Yes. It's not working. Very strange." Laguerre clicked her tongue. "Higgins."

Higgins released her. Hollis gradually shifted, sat up. Laguerre was staring at her, holding her Gem in one hand and a ziploc bag of cubes in the other. Higgins stepped back beside her, missing an ear, compulsively touching. A fresh hole in the ceiling belied strange shadows. "Apologies," said Laguerre. "We wanted make you feel better."

Hollis struggled upright. She passed them, stood at the point. Ryatt was gone, must have just slipped right in. Darn. WHOOPS.

She closed her eyes, and entered.

Back to void. Listening for the rush of disturbed pressure, the silence of large objects. The clap of shoes rang perfectly on some hard, rough surface, not asphalt, sharper.

Hollis repeatedly lost sight of Laguerre and Higgins and had to trace their footfalls. Each time she was briefly certain of solitude there came a terror that gravity would reverse and she'd fall forever. The notion of being f*cked with one final time was too great to bear - but there was worse. This null world was a perfect canvas for all kinds of hallucination - hot colors and razor shapes sprouted in the back compartments of her eyes. If these objects could manifest then what else? Exact images leapt to mind. If she started seeing them…and Ryatt out here somewhere…

Laguerre and Higgins seemed at least as disturbed. Their silent correspondence kept breaking, they whispered to each other. Higgins was panicky. Where were the wraiths? They edged closer, and surprisingly included Hollis - someone, she imagined Laguerre, grabbed her shoulder and pulled her in. It was cold was the reason she didn't pull away.

"It has to be taking us somewhere," whispered Higgins. "It can't just leave us here."

"It could," said Laguerre, "But it wouldn't make any sense. All wraiths aim for direct confrontation on unequal terms. And we'd reach the edge if it left us too long. It intends a killing field."

"Are we ready?" asked Higgins.

Silence. Higgins laughed nervously. "You wouldn't happen to have some ace in the hole Ames, you know, a killer idea. Maybe what we can, uh, expect…"

Hollis scowled.It came from Yolanda.

"Effectively," said Laguerre. "It spawned from the particular killing of that girl."

Okay. Yolanda was brutal. Psycho crazy. She had a whatsit, a god complex? So…

"Brutality is interesting," said Laguerre. "It could account for the hands. Imagine crushing. Although this has been a rather straightforward miasma. You'd imagine more punishment."

It filled Ryatt with worms.

"So it did." Laguerre ahem'd. "Psychology comes in somewhere, maybe affects behavior. But it's all very indeterminate. Way too many variables, so theory ends up being impractical. If we could predict what kind of betrayal would make what Archon...in fact consider your friend Dyson, she only produced a greater wraith. Why? If both of them had decided the relationship was over maybe it didn't count in the same way. Or they were never very close in the first place. We can only guess."

Yeah.

Shapes. Distant, mutant skyscraper rectangles at odd tilts. Shelves, Hollis realized, twenty stories each, spitting with gothic adornments and gargoyles, compartments agape. The sky seemed to brighten a little, enough to reveal more endlessly tombstoning into the flatlands, along with smaller objects, drifts of rotted cars, some close.

Higgins sniffed. "Plan," she whispered.

"It's simple," said Laguerre, "When it appears we'll fight from range. Ames will hide."

Why,said Hollis

At the nearest of the towers, a flush of movement. Shapes flicked in the static sky - the gargoyle things dropped from their perches. They poured silently into a sort of loose long-tailed blob. Laguerre stopped, Hollis and Higgins bumblecrushed behind her. She turned, spectral in the pseudo-light. "Practically speaking you're a liability against the Archon."

Hollis glared.I can fight.

The cloud approached, not gargoyles at all but smooth, agile, giant birds. They had a sound like dry paper. Hollis couldn't count how many. She must have looked a little weird, because Higgins said, "It's cool, we'll watch out for you Ames. Don't worry it's our job."

She hated that. Where did they get such sh*t?Focus on the Archon.

"Of course we will," Laguerre shouted past the growing din. She raised her staff, Higgins shouldered her rifle.Get ready.

Almost above, the formation bloomed out ameboid, swirling circularly in a kind of dome. From all directions came shrill blackboard hell. Laguerre let loose a ball lightning five times her own size, Higgins fired, both of the shots went deep and detonated into purplish tendrils and napalm. Enveloped were probably a quarter of the birds, and as the light faded hundreds plummeted into cubes or thrashed on fire. The relatively unharmed remainder dove in multifarious streams, each one countered with prompt firework dazzle, nothing got through.

Cubes showered though they never seemed to hit Laguerre or Higgins they kept popping Hollis precisely on the head. Haha, HIDE? No, there had to be some utility. But even cube collection required hands… Maybe, yes. Out in those cars somewhere, if only she could peruse them, inch away a little, it couldn't have just disappeared…but she'd checked out on an increase in avian flesh, so many that the light of the explosions dimmed. From ever shelf-tower rose a steady stream, combining into a fat river headed directly, uh, here.

Laguerre's voice floated.We'll need to nip this in the bud, be prepared.

The first intact bird careened into the smooth ground and skidded, uncoordinated, flapping into a charge toward Laguerre who effortlessly pirouetted to zzzap it to nonexistence with a flick of her staff. Another zipped in and clipped Hollis' scalp with a talon, the flesh tore, hair flew. She howled in frustration and fired up, uselessly, another cheeky f*cker wraith grabbed the raised barrel and ripped off her feet and fell on her pecking like a chicken, the flesh so weak and perforated it could tear off entire chunks, she, couldn't even bat it off! Auuggg-

NOW,shouted Laguerre.

SnapSHOT. A titan flyswatter whacked Hollis' curled up body. Pain on every surface. The air was plasma, burning even the inside. She forced open her watery eyes. Cubes bounced and heaped, ash drifted in curtains amidst suspended static crackles. The heavily culled wraiths swirled uncertainly, fed by more, again thickening.

Laguerre knelt calmly. Her staff was dully red, her palms steamed where they touched. Higgins, on her ass like Hollis, scrambled up and aimed her rifle all around. Laguerre stood with total zen.Come,she said.

Hollis came. They stood there, dazed.Wait,said Laguerre. The birds retracted, hovering away. A rumble, a sharp crack. The ground rolled as a volcanic plume burst in the far distance, burgeoning a great subvocal hum. Out of the cloud stretched a pale shape, a huge tenebrous hand, followed by another, another. They jammed into the ground and heaved a body of blobbed utter darkness.

No, not utter. It opened. The pitch slid away over big, straight teeth, a full set, fleshless and suspended. The birds above coalesced into a circling halo.

There,said Laguerre.

It moved. The arms undulated, a harmonic ballet on fragile fingers, making good speed. Laguerre and Higgins belted off a twin volley, the projectiles zipped across the distance in seconds. Clumps of birds disengaged to intercept each one, perishing in immolative bursts as the archon walked directly through, untouched.

Higgins,said Laguerre. Higgins tossed something at Hollis, who barely caught her own slippery dark Gem.Watch yourself.She darted away in an arc, slashing her staff in a spray of flares, followed by Higgins, their projectiles curving in the sky, sometimes achieving the central bolus, mostly not.

Everything was so far beyond. Wait it out, yeah? Nothing to be gained from staying in the field, she was useless then so be it. NO, f*ck. Had she learned nothing at all, was she back to square one, evil rat scuttling…but she didn't want to die, that was true, wasn't it clear that she'd only ever wanted to live, that everything had been for that goal…boil it down and what did you get. What concise lesson, what appropriate measure. God tell her, only God could do it, Hollis had never been enough…

Metal roared on a terrifying stage. The archon, having neared a tower, had ripped off a whole platform and now hurled it end over end, swooping, gouging the ground far beyond as what it had been trying to hit, airborne Higgins, slipped away unscathed.

Hollis laughed. Only this. Okay! In that case, uh, the BODY. In the cars, more cars than before, rust corners snagging her pitted skin. Scorched lumps hid among the frames, all looking the same. It didn't seem likely they were anything but human corpses, all of them. But which one?

This one, she decided. Wedged awkwardly between two chassis, charred and small - it looked right. She lifted it out and slipped it around her neck.Do you have Ryatt's Gem,she asked Laguerre.

What?An explosion boomed, close.This isn't the time.

I need to know.

She's fine I believe,Higgins has her.

Hollis swallowed. What, then? She looked around wildly. The nearest tower…if she could get up high maybe…

She started off towards the nearest, winding among berms of rusting junkers, buffeted by noise and shock and light. She could barely tell what was happening anymore, the sky all detonations and hard grey steel almost levitating before it crashed to earth. One blast came from almost directly above and slammed her to the ground, she bounced cartoonishly, she fought back up.

Laguerre's voice blared.Ames, stay calm. It's trying to follow you.

What? Hollis looked over her shoulder. The archon did look like it was trying to do that, resolutely drifting, held back inefficiently by a wall of fire. She plodded sickly. At the bottom of the tower was a wide opening, what would have been the dusty ground level slit of a regular shelving unit. Hollis ducked in, scanning the darkness, an acid scent…It's okay. I know what to do.

More corpses littered the floor, she trod their soft-stiff flesh to a wall and traced it. Barely any light even with the explosions. What she hoped for was stairs, but why would there be stairs? In this case the world really was evil, malicious to her life and success, sprouting actual death from every crevice in a way at least comprehensible enough to kill - and yes, here were some crackling friends. She cut through them back to the light.

She stuffed her other stump into her bag. The archon was closer, arms waving torn scraphunks at invisible gnats, fruitlessly it seemed. Detonations slipped into the central mass, peeling off bits of shadow and severing arms at the root as the tooth-maw widened and closed sensually, without sound.

She angled away from the tower and raised the new tool, a goofy steel rectangle with a hole in the end. On firing a grabby claw arced perfectly halfway up the tower and latched on. It ripped her off her feet and ripped her arm out of socket. She crunched awkwardly into the lip of the opening, boney bag clattering. Finally she hauled herself over and suffered to stand as the claw retracted smoothly.

Wraiths here also. She shot them. It wasn't hard. The best her power got transcended mechanism - the object became pure action. Need tons to die at once, sure enough. The bullet exploded into grapeshot and they all fell.

Ames, you can't do anything.Higgins.

I have the right.

What? What does that even mean?

Why else do I exist.

The cable curved supernaturally to hook onto the next level. Higher, higher. A wayward bird assaulted her midway up, aiming for the arm which was connected to the box. Hollis slapped it spiralling away and blasted it to bits.

You will let us do our job,said Laguerre.

From this latest platform undulated a tubesnake thing, which Hollis shot like five times before it collapsed into dust.

You're self-destructing.

Had to be getting to the top.I'm fixing it.

Nothing fixes this.

f*ck you.

The next floor. As she stood no walls or gaggle of wraiths met her, just weird interference sky. She turned around. Heyyyy said the archon, cilia-arms awave in a multijointed parade. Not looking so hot. It limped and wobbled, shrunken so its monstrous teeth seized together.

Hollis pointed the barrel at the miserable thing. She sweated, squinted. The moment, the summit, visualize perfection…

It didn't come. Her whole stance evaporated. The grapple box fell off and she slipped her stump in her bag.Who's nearby.

I am,said Higgins.

Okay. Okay.I can't do it.

Right. Coming.

Well let's see. What might be that orange glint near the horizon line? Just bounding, fantastic tower to tower arcs, a potshot or two to help Laguerre with the archon. Headed fast too. A couple seconds inbound, be mindful just so's the momentum carries her, aim carefully-

Wait f*ck YOU NO

Hollis fired. Higgins' head vanished. Her body whacked into the roof of the tower, slid, and stopped.

Hollis hobbled over. She dug around courtesy a sloppy prosthetic hand, it was here, this wasn't a mistake, yes, was it imagination or could Hollis feel the remains reacting already? She pocketed the Gem and made sure Higgins still had her own, dragged the body to the edge, looked, not too much wreckage below, and nudged it off. Better not mind the impact.

Okay. She raised the rifle again. The barrel drifted into exactly the correct spot. A shiver went down from the place it melded to her flesh. Laguerre beamed some thought, aw f*ck, who cared. Hollis did it.

The shot streaked out, a golden tracerform that halfway across doubled inexplicably in size, an insane plug. Birds amassed and were incinerated. It plowed directly into the archon, and in the half-second before detonation a deep groan rolled from every angle, from the ground and sky.

The shockwave crumpled her. She barely kept her knees to watch the archon palsy into the ground, minus a quarter of its previous mass. Now, now a low fidelity murderhowl of indeterminate humanity. Her eardrums were gone so it must have been telepathic.

The tower creaked as something important snapped far below. It toppled. A great darkness opened up, into which everything was magnetically pulled. And Hollis too swirled, down into liquid…

She opened her eye. Grit on all sides. Concrete? Pinned, broken limbs. The universe was cyclical.

She jerked and ripped out what she could. Only a leg slid out relatively unharmed, enough to kick, badly. Something caved - gravel shushed out of the breach, revealing darkness, not total but a cloggy curdling of the air, stagnant breeze…

I'm alive,she said.

Nothing responded.

Her gun arm stuck as she weaseled out. When she tugged the gleaming barrel disconnected. She stood, barely. All around was, a normal Walmart. There'd definitely been a blast, shelves knocked asunder - but correctly scaled. Burst tubs of cat litter. Not a wraith in sight. Though maybe the floor ate her or something. Maybe those dark spots in the litter were larval creatures in waiting…crushed under a collapsed shelf was a huge one. Hollis didn't immediately recognize it as a bloodsoaked teenage girl, caked in grey peppercorns. She looked elsewhere.

Outside the bathrooms then, if the topography and evidence was trustworthy. She had been transported back. She may have never left. Or was it a mockup? Too confusing. Past time to get out. She checked, the body, yes, the Gem, yes. She picked a random, wrecked aisle.

A few steps down a regiment of common wraiths manifested from behind to menace after her. She hurried into a larger passageway, a thick vein. Did she recognize it? A girl sat by a pillar with a knife in her half eaten chest. Hollis passed, the wraiths gabbed louder as they came to the body, she looked and didn't like what she saw.

When she turned back the archon was there.

She almost tripped. Pure compounding mass stretched above like a miniature sky, bearing nothing but pearl teeth and humongous arms. It had appeared without sound and made none now as it reeeaaached-

Hollis whipped around and ran and stumbled and skidded and ran. The wraith crowd, now considerable, opened its collective arms hungrily. She tried to budge with her shoulder, didn't quite work, they snagged Ryatt right off her neck and she had to double back, bitten and pulled, she wrested Ryatt from the wraith that was eating her but by then so many more were gathered simperingly on her limbs, momentum impossible, she fell over amidst a forest of dusty linen, descending onto her but she found the strength to scrabble like a Christmas movie tyke through the psuedo-legs and somehow emerge, flying forever, insane with terror.

It poked out of an aisle as she passed. Seconds later later this happened again. It was teleporting. Whipping by another site of disaster with bubbled tile and more dead bodies there it was too, snatching corpses, stuffing them inside. She entered clothing racks that bumbled her to psychotic rage for endless moments, could be ANYWHERE and she was STUCK, and thrust her with no warning into checkout lanes and the mercilessly empty strip beyond. A million miles down was the clusterf*ck, the van and hole and smears where bodies had been.

Between here and there an optometrist's clinic sprouted a hundred limbs.

She didn't consider, she ran full bore, gonna pass, gonna dodge. As she slid by something hit the small of her back and literally folded her. Her useless body slid past blurred everything, thanks a lot now she was closer, but her legs wouldn't move how she wanted. The archon gently loomed.

Okay, arms worked. She squirmed like a worm, elbows hooked on the slick tile for leverage. Get to the van and she didn't know what. Hide under it and die. She strained, so slow, now came a good solid headache. It, it touched her leg, the fingers werewarm-

Hollis knew what she could do with the f*cking van. Hahaha, f*ck IT. She wrenched away from the fingers, somehow her legs obeyed, she scrabbled and took a backhand and whammed into the side of the minivan explosively. Small matter to pull herself under.

It was probably wrong to think an Archon had any real intelligence. Implacable malice could taunt but not strategize, or it might have wondered why Hollis had cornered herself under a wholly mundane car. The idea had come in a flash of total bullsh*t. It represented nothing. Five seconds of desperate grasping, could that do a goddamn thing? Tactics and procedures alone helped you live. You needed to figure it all out, stay out of the depths, keep safe, come up with a plan, better yet you never have to.

But none of that mattered after all. It was impossible to save anything. So why not?

The archon flattened to see where Hollis had gone. Its matte surface took up the whole view. The teeth, they were as big as her chest.

In the back of the minivan, all at once, a hundred fifty grenades jettisoned their pins. Onetwothreefour.

A giant handspan wrapped around the entire minivan and pulled it away. Others took her, raised her up, brought her in-

Fivesixseveneight.

Into the mouth itself between those crusher slabs across the barrier of darkness that scoured skin and brought demon visions, oh god only Ryatt didn't deserve it, let her escape punishment at least, she can't be more to me but I will die for her sacred transcendence, a good thing, a truly good thing beyond compunction-

The explosion annihilates a quarter of the building. A huddle of Magical Girls preparing to storm the miasma briefly fly. Regular humans sustain permanent injury. Every singular window for a mile shatters.

The flow is terror. People duck away splintered with glass, they hide and scream. Over the next minute shrapnel rains down, puncturing cars, houses, people. Everyone eventually notices the other very important change. The dome of corruption has evaporated completely.

On one of five concurrent livestreams, thirty thousand people simultaneously: "HOLY sh*t, HOLY f*ck, THEY DID IT."

Politicians hear the news and drop out mid-speech. The President will appear in six hours for a national address which, starved of information by wary USMF leadership, the press cycle drains for weeks.

Before that the original penetration force, plus five more, enters the dust cloud. They work up to the building and spread wide until someone finds the edge of a rubble grade, which they surround, vaporizing wraiths such as they appear. Near the top something shifts. A figure rises which may also be a wraith, and the Magical Girls almost go too far. No. The likeness is of a person, blackened, literally in tatters.

It tugs something off of its neck that might heretofore have been mistaken for its own flesh. It slings out the object like a tarred towel, undulating momentarily, slapping off the bottom of the mound. As the assault team numbly processes, the figure becomes agitated. It shifts atop its perch, gesturing incomprehensibly, doubling over into a pneumonic wheeze.

"Come down here," shouts a Magical Girl.

The figure ratchets straight. "f*ck YOU."

"You better desist right f*cking now!"

"WATCH THIS BITCH."

It ducks, and five distinct beams pound the spot in a gout of grit. There are several detonations. But when the dust clears and the Magical Girls begin to climb the rubble, the figure is gone.

Branches branches. A forest was so sh*tty. Uneven ground and roots tripping up. She kept f*cking falling over.

Vaguest of flashes maybe, she found herself in a bunch of trees when her heart calmed and her vision stopped blending together so much, only then aware. Of her sight! From both eyes! And her hands! And feet. And?

She'd had to crawl out of rubble, again, cooked through yes, alive, yes. Impossibly. It had killed the archon, hadn't it? Or had it? Was this still a miasma? No, bright out, wouldn't make sense. But then her being here itself was a contradiction since Magical Girls were not invulnerable and this was a situation that required invulnerability to occur. Even the most recent escape, beams had sliced her back, they should have bisected her, but when she reached back it was just the same charbroiled expanse.

Was she really blessed, like Yolanda said? She didn't feel blessed bumbling into trees covered in crunchy charcoal but what else could account for it?

Think. Dorchester died, Yolanda went through a series of miracles and died, now Hollis was also going through a series of even more unlikely events. Would she be the one to survive, was that how the sequence worked? What a f*cking runaround! It didn't fix anything! sh*t, why a blessing? Why not a curse? A sequential curse where it just got worse…

Oh sh*t. No no no. She mashed her face with a hand and bumbled even more. How could it be that way? What about Texas! They were saying ever since DuPage - if you hate your own little sh*thole come down, be part of a movement. The assumption being it existed, which, did it?

Hollis stumbled over a road into a wire fence. She ripped the wires out and trudged into exceptionally tall grass. In the distance was thethupthupof a helicopter but so far away it didn't matter. No cops, or maybe she'd finessed them by chance. Her skin began to crackle and fall off in charred sheets, revealing healthy flesh.

Could, could it have been neutralized, the entire state of Texas? Rendered uninhabitable for her alone? Just, because of her circ*mstances! Anyone could see she'd done her best to work with what she was given. Accidents was all. And she'd created the archon, maybe, but then she killed it! Saved lives! People she didn't even know! In defiance of the wide world, a crucial decision at the right moment that could reverse brutality, bringing it right back…

To zero. The complete equation. That was the one time she'd succeeded, in the return to obliviation. The moment Dorchester began to change she died. Yolanda just got worse, and when Hollis killed her to try to do good an archon was created. The scales realigned.

She stopped in the field, which she was still in, it seemed to go on forever, she stopped and tugged out her Gem. It was the color of pitch.

Well sure. How does a null value nullify? Death implied prior being, but Hollis was practically nonexistent anyway! Guaranteed to "survive", guaranteed not to matter. Crazies could go f*ck themselves, none of them would ever touch, their sh*t meant nothing, no sh*t meant anything. Every solitary moment was in reach except what she never really expected, certain scenarios, whispers she dared hope for, fulfillments, Dyson the human. Thoughts, thoughts.

The world itself worked literal miracles to destroy it all. Except Ryatt. Which Hollis didn't want to think about right now. All she actually wanted was to go totally insane. Wasn't that what happened, from the revelation? And then it was over, or something. But consider - a living void couldn't change. So, she was STUCK like this! Forever inside this feeling, untouchable…

Green in all directions, swishing in a loose musculature over the marshy ground. She lowered herself to her knees, and inclined her head to the very blue sky. The sun had an angle deep into her skin. She squinted. The cloak, having reappeared fully repaired, soaked with mud and adhered to her legs. She couldn't figure out what she needed to do. Her eyes prickled. She got back up and wobbled a few paces towards what sounded like peaceful silence. A road appeared. Stopped in the middle of the road was a station wagon. The door chugged and out stepped the kid, coming around the hood. His arms were stiff on his shoulders and he had a pistol, which he raised. "Tell me what you did with her."

Hollis shook her head. She laughed violently, hooted and wheezed. She didn't seem able to stop.

His face tightened like saran wrap. "Don't f*ck with me."

She eked out her words through tears. "Nice gun."

"I know where to aim."

"Ahaaa, right! But that won't help. I'm going to live forever. You and me multiply to NOTHING. You're already doomed! You'll trip a little, hit the ground, the bullet will ricochet into your leg, you'll bleed out while I watch. Or, a few days from now. A heart attack sounds convenient."

The kid solidified his grip on the pistol and stared straight at her like a horse.

Hollis scoffed. "sh*t. Wanna see?" She spread her arms. "Kill me."

"Huh." He backed behind the car. He lowered himself with the pistol resting on the hood. He was sweating and redfaced, swallowing. "Just tell me where-"

"f*ckING DO IT."

He jerked and the pistol jerked and it impacted Hollis' chest. She stepped onto the road strongly and toppled into an unshielded fall, groaning into asphalt as pressure spread up her throat like she was going to vomit but she only spluttered hot air, sh*theel couldn't even hit the right f*ckING spot. Never had she experienced such pain even when the worms seemed to inhabit every inch something so much deeper now pressed the desperate cords of her soul. Enough of this with enough time might break her and various urges leapt, tear open her chest, peel off her face. But they faded.

The car door chunked. The engine cranked and went. Darkness thickened the air. She moved to sit up. She didn't move. Her limbs were far away and her brain told them to move and they didn't. She laid there staring through nothing, even her eyes wouldn't go and the only motion she made was an autonomic retching that suffused much of her body but was going still.

Fine. Whatever. Chalk it up to psychological weakness. She'd suffered a lot, a collapse wasn't strange. Nothing had changed. In a little bit she'd get up. Just a second. Go out and find that kid, and then…and then…

Oh…

Chapter 8: Firing Into a Continent

Chapter Text

EPILOGUE

First Lieutenant Penelope Schuman was to report to Fort Stewart immediately. So said a sheet of paper delivered by some kid who on confirming that her fingers held the sheet vanished into an undulation of military personnel, and perhaps ceased to exist. The struggle toward organization was quickly becoming inscrutable, so when she read the message she understood that she was extraneous and it was best to let it sort itself out.

She considered the relevant girls and after a healthy indecision chose Nentwig as successor, a pre-DuPage colleague who led her own pod of Magical Girls well in hard times. Nentwig was already in de facto command of the group of girls inside the building and took it in stride.I'll contact you when I'm able to,Schuman told her.

In the parking lot they were setting up tents and running in formation and hauling big containers. She slid through and made good time. Soon she came to the road, which was lined with vehicles, a tank awkwardly mired on the shoulder. Further down, beside a sandpainted humvee, two girls in military uniform waved. As she walked over she recognized Second Lieutenant Danville. "Tough day," said Second Lieutenant Danville.

A broadfaced man drove them out past assembling barricades and a series of severe traffic jams. Schuman's own uniform was rumpled and had an unsightly blemish all down the left sleeve, from a coffee can dislodged circa The Explosion. She shifted her sleeve to conceal the spot, for dignity's sake.

"We'll need to talk," said Danville, "after the debriefing you'll be meeting the Colonel. Try to figure out how you want to handle it. We'll be here to help."

The Second Lieutenant, reassigned to Atlanta and no longer under Schuman's purview, was remembered primarily because in a miasma she would break from the defensive formation under pretext and attempt stunts with the wraiths. Shockingly, she had somehow learned to wear herself well. Miracles of Atlanta.

They rode at exact cruising speed for all forty five miles of Georgia forest country between Statesboro and Savannah. Outside the city they stopped at a nondescript hotel and slunk in like vandals. Danville pointed to a room and waited alongside the other girl - Ratke the nametag said, another Atlanta name - while Schuman went in. A full uniform lay on the grungy bed. She undressed precisely, pulled it on, folded the old clothes at the end of the bed, and returned to the humvee.

The hardcut face at the Fort Stewart gate waved them through after a card check. The base was prominently empty and the few visible people walked in shame. They stopped outside an indistinguishably squat building and Danville guided her through glass doors that said INTELLIGENCE CENTER and deposited her in an unlabeled room with white walls, a desk in the middle with two chairs, and a protruding ceiling light. She sat at the far end and waited for an officer to enter and take the other chair, which he did. He had a young face and a clipboard. She told him that two days before the incident she was informed by way of Kyubey that the group of Magical Girls inhabiting Savannah were becoming nervous and incoherent. She agreed with him that it was best to take action at the early stage. Research on the Magical Girls in question suggested a negligible threat. She was therefore careless in preparing the situation and allowed the Marques girl to incapacitate her, and because of her neglect for proper command roles the remaining Magical Girls were unable to salvage the situation. As soon as she was able she arranged to be transported to the site. Soon after the miasma dissipated.

The officer scribbled a thing on his board, saluted, and left. A few minutes later Danville poked in, crowding a pile of chips and canned soda under her arm. Schuman followed her back to the humvee where Danville handed her a bag of Barbecue Lays which she did not open but pinned cautiously between her knees.

They drove to a larger INTELLIGENCE CENTER. Danville and Ratke flanked her inside. A man at a desk saluted, ignored by Danville, who had downed an entire can of soda in the humvee, was drinking one now as she walked, and had a third stuffed in her armpit. Ratke peered around with some twinkling secret in her eyes. Down three halls Danville led the way into a whitewalled boardroom with a plain plastic table and many swivel chairs in varying clusters of order. Danville and Ratke took twin chairs and Schuman sat directly across from them.

"Okay," said Danville, "we don't have much time. First of all you need to get into the mindset. These people are angry, they're protecting themselves, they're looking for someone to blame. That's you."

"They aren't happy," said Ratke, the first time she'd spoken. "If you think some insular protection dealie is going to happen here you're dead wrong. You're probably getting flayed either way."

Said Danville, "What you can try to do is mitigate it. A lot of that's subliminal. I see your uniform is respectable but something about your posture is, unappetizing. The eyes, too. Like you've given up. Which is pretty much fatal."

Ratke nodded. "They'll notice in a second."

"Fix those eyes."

Schuman tried. Her one limp experience with the Colonel, her induction to Second Lieutenant, did not suggest a very discerning person - the woman passed over people as she might assorted objects. Admittedly, the circ*mstances today were different.

Danville eventually nodded. "Now: how you speak. Proper courtesy, obviously - I respect you enough, Schuman, to believe you have that mostly handled. However, the rest you need to calculate. The goal is to,primally intimidatethem, but not in a way that makes them dislike you. It's hard. You could use coaching, but…" She clicked her tongue. Ratke mirrored her, louder.

Schuman had begun to collapse over the desk. She straightened and cleared her throat. "I apologize. I was unable to sleep last night. It won't happen again."

"Maybe you should eat those chips," suggested Ratke. "For energy."

Schuman had been unwilling to leave the bag of barbecue chips in the humvee, and had naturally taken it inside and placed it on the table when she sat down.

Danville nodded. "Good idea. Go on, Schuman."

Schuman looked not at the bag but at the table directly below it. Ratke leaned over and with her fingertips pushed it forward until it fell onto Schuman's lap. She delicately pulled it open. She picked a chip out and ate the chip. Danville belted the rest of her soda, dropped the empty can on the table, and cracked open the third. Ratke produced vinegar chips from her uniform and ate ravenously. Danville placed the open can on the table, untouched.

"Well," she said, "It's more than demeanor, too. A whole way of talking. Kind of a spin, so it looks like you're taking responsibility, but with dignity."

Schuman breathed. "I think I understand."

Danville smiled. "Maybe. But if you want to impress these people you need to up the stakes. Really get in the element. It may be hopeless."

"Sadly so," mumbled Ratke through many chips.

"But you have to try. Hey, your embarrassment is ours. They don't tend to understand, we can only work with what we have. Try to overcome your limitations for our sake. Give it your all!" She suddenly slammed her palm on the table. The full can of soda jolted over and spilled into an amoeboid mass that began to cascade off the side of the table. Danville ducked in and wiped the spillage into a broad smear with her sleeve.

Ratke said, "Do what you can."

Danville nodded. "I believe in you."

"My chances are good," said Schuman, "Given that they apparently must withstand people like you."

Danville smiled. Ratke snickered into her chips.

There was a knock on the door. "Oh well," said Danville. She shook off her dripping sleeve on the table, "Like I said, we only work with what we have. Good luck," as she went to the opening door followed by mirthful Ratke. At the threshold they simultaneously snapped crisp salutes. Then they slipped out.

The Colonel entered, followed by USMF General Phillip Geeting, followed by about five men in good suits. Geeting was even more ashen and bone-hollowed than pictures suggested, mere plaster in encrusted full dress - the invigorated Colonel and her entourage of specious goons outpaced him all the way to the table. The Colonel sat in front of the empty cans, crossing her arms, the sleeves of her own uniform impeccably just below her wrists. The men stood arrayed behind her. As Geeting finally sat his sleeve fell directly on the slick of half-dried soda. He huffed, picking his eye with a gristle finger.

Schuman rubbed the dust off on her pant leg and saluted.

One goon produced a folder. Schuman took it and opened it and read the details of her reassignment to Alaska in three days' time. She parsed three times slowly and closed the folder. The Colonel saluted and got up. Geeting scuttled in tow, slowly peeling his sleeve from the table, helped by one of the suits. They exited the room and left the door open.

Danville and Ratke drove her to her quarters at Fort Benning - an endless crossing of forest. When Schuman wasn't looking they stole smirks with each other, and otherwise prattled. As night fell Schuman could not avoid slipping into her door and drifting amidst their meaningless words. She was never fully asleep, indeed kept herself from sleep since it wasn't necessary or realistic, but when she finally entered her quarters she somehow wandered to her bed, and the morning after woke up muted and dull.

She milled for focus. Every news program forever covered the Statesboro tragedy, which had taken at least sixty lives. Ainsley Peckenpaugh, first and best casualty, appeared in many intimate photos with her vapid family. Penelope Schuman also appeared, and was NEGLIGENT and OVERCONFIDENT. The incident itself, inevitable. Why? Long term trends, inefficiency, blech. But when she checked her phone, she found that the world at large agreed. They also thought she had a stuck up appearance and odd body language.

Suppose she had work. In a cramped space like her Savannah apartment she could pull it from the air itself, useful topics for unofficial dinners, or the convolutions of the Magical Girls under her command, a particularly satisfying subject because it was a sincere reason to engage in social trash. The fact that she was no longer in command wouldn't stop her. It was the quarters themselves. A pedestrian, military house like this promoted erosion. Magical girls entered normal and came out wearing heart sunglasses. Insipid.

But. When after three hours of television she finally went to brush her teeth, she briefly spotted an amorphous presence inside the bathroom and waited at the precipice for twenty minutes. Could worse await outside? As in the few times she'd been sick or injured, she solved the dilemma by hunkering down, motionless, and waiting for her clear head to return. Today the fever would not abate. Mid-afternoon she pinged telepathically for other Magical Girls and received no response from the entire base. Relocated? Surely it didn't make sense to move all of them on account of Statesboro. When she received a text from Nentwig she didn't look, beginning to wonder about her phone, military issue, easily surveilled…

At the proper time she turned off the TV. She unplugged it from the wall. In near darkness she wandered, sitting on the bed, hovering in the kitchen. Every time she closed her eyes she sensed mass behind her. She checked the garage and found the car, a dusty junk with the keys on the passenger seat. In went her few Benning possessions, an empty suitcase and a fake potted plant. She drove into the lightless neighborhood, good houses and grass that was green, and the big well above totally black, hiding its stars. With no porchbound and drunk Magical Girls to shout it down with slogans, Benning became its true self - a vacuous hole, padded in cynicism and comfortable for despair.

In the base proper she passed a hulking cargo truck. The pale driver raised a hand, she raised hers, and they passed.

Schuman had a vague understanding of her purpose. Her end destination was Savannah, four odd hours away, and in transit a set of goals comprising duty, curiosity, and sightseeing. The two day window gave her the luxury of completing all of them. To be safe she'd probably eschew sleep.

Her first task, close half the distance. Nothing significant lay from Columbus to Macon, where she could finally leave the chaotic country roads through I-16, and from there go directly to Savannah. Since she had a goal of importance to complete in Macon, it was in her interests to move fast and complete the first stage. If it were her knowledge of the roads and her driving capabilities alone she would have no issue.

What she hadn't counted on was the state of the car. It was a principled backup to her true vehicle - a sleek Malibu presumably still in Savannah - which had twin benefits in affordability and pleasing blocky aesthetic. Its functionality proved dubious. One hour in the engine began to shiver. The bad suspension and loose seatbelt jumbled Schuman indiscriminately. The driver side door frequently came unstuck. Confined to this sorry state, accompanied only by far off tail lights, a lost-at-sea notion began to enter her mind. Georgia wasn't entirely clear of wraiths, even ignoring tangles like Valdosta. Grief seeped into the stretches of land between cities, increasing disappearances, cueing accidents of happenstance. It would be inaccurate to say she was worried, because at the levels found here only an incompetent Magical Girl would succumb. Rather, there was a sense of unmooring, underlying tension, apparently meaningless.

Not that there was any point in dwelling. Those girls who regretted the past and dreaded the future doomed themselves to uselessness. Did mere unease need closure? Let it dissipate.

Around fifteen minutes later the engine barked decisively and the force went out of the car. She guided it to the side of the road. She walked a good distance away, cast a light enchantment, and waved until someone stopped. The one that finally did was a steely sun-peeled pickup. The driver looked increasingly sorry as Schuman gathered her possessions into the passenger seat.

After a few minutes of chill road he coughed. "Listen, tell me you aren't in trouble. I'm not liable."

"That's the case."

"Sure. I've got respect for the forces. It's cool. Just, on the side of the road like that. Not every day. I won't ask."

"Okay."

He didn't ask. Twenty minutes later they entered mostly-dead Macon. She got out at a rest stop just inside the city and took the suitcase but not the potted plant, which she extended to him from outside the truck. "Here."

"What?"

She pressed it on him. He knitted his brow and placed it in the passenger seat gingerly. She nodded, closed the door, and walked toward the deeper core as the truck pulled in the opposite direction.

Like many choked cities of the interior, Macon did not fare so well. Schuman remembered it as a series of mild annoyances that only began once the original claimant egressed - proliferations of wraiths, scarcity of infrastructure, distressing people. Even those Magical Girls spawned from it - two that Schuman knew of with Ainsley dead - expressed a common sentiment toward incineration. Truly, Macon was only unappetizing. It possessed virtues. It was the only place for miles where Schuman knew she could get a rental, and it was also where Ainsley's parents lived. First she would get the car. It would give her time to figure out what she needed to say.

She asked for directions from a passing car and was pointed amiably east. One interesting thing: despite the opinion of the worldly Magical Girl, most people seemed useful and sympathetic. It was true that Schuman hadn't had much occasion to be exposed to the world as a mere girl, rather than a Magical Girl in military uniform. Presumably they were a lot more dismissive, though she had trouble picturing it. Which was dangerous. Nobody liked the annoying clueless. If someone like that was going to lead, they had to shell beneath layers of mystery. The natural response, luckily. As they laugh over grim childhoods and turn to you, a knowing smile will become their own experience magnified. So different from comfortable Athens, dicey wraith runs at most, peanuts - rumors to live by. The people who made her First Lieutenant would be disgusted to learn that she had never held tangible control over her subordinates, but instead fostered a rawly democratic shared interest group. The sorority clump, essentially chaotic. Long term, chaos neutralized advantage. It did not do to forget that the days of loose alliances were full of death and misery, as calculated by the Incubator. Schuman hadn't forgotten, precisely. It had only seemed workable.

Indulgence of rot. Stop. It's fine. It's fine.

The car rental was small, a tiny cube in a parking lot of incongruous vehicles, completely barren of human life. The door was locked. She brought out her phone long enough to log the time, which was one in the morning. She sat beside the door. Everything was motionless everywhere, the night air perfectly warm and humid. She slipped down…

They shook her awake in the morning. Two people stood above, one a middle-aged secretary and the other, the one doing the shaking, a balding man in a polo shirt. He slid away as her eyes opened. "Ah, how're you doing there."

Schuman blinked rapidly She wobbled up, pale from shock. Her suitcase was gone.

"Can I call someone miss?"

She shook her head. "I need to rent a car."

"Oh sure enough. If you'll just come on in then."

Inside he commenced to ramble. Schuman told him the car she wanted, a black jeep. He elaborated on its virtues (?) and intersection with his personal history (?) At one point he transparently glared at the hovering secretary and made a little motion near his ear. Schuman ended it there. "Sir, what you're doing is obstructing a member of the US military in a time of crisis."

"Aw jeez, that's not-"

"Yes. Consider."

He considered, and gave up the price. Schuman immediately matched it in cash. He trailed her outside, talking and talking, and waved as she drove off.

Better hurry. While Schuman had no objection to law enforcement it was also sure that when they located her they wouldn't let her out of sight. She needed to talk to the Peckenpaugh folks without outside eyes, otherwise she would become indistinguishable and the important things she had to say would be neutered. Which things, unclear. She would never offer condolences since that had already been done, and in error, the people in question being dim-eyed failures who under any circ*mstances would produce a girl like Ainsley, Robert Peckenpaugh applying fat fingers to trade jobs while Melinda Peckenpaugh wandered the house with her four year old child and geriatric Shih Tzu, the child a subject of tension, Robert frequently angry or drunk. Despite the non-functionality of their family unit they continually stumbled into good money, undoubtedly because of something pertaining to Ainsley's wish.

Schuman had come to know none of this through Ainsley herself, but via a protracted campaign of personal research and intelligence gathering. She couldn't justify it as anything other than morbidity, no reason for Ainsley as subject except that she was particularly vicious, an isolationist with a mean power. Neither had Schuman previously entertained hopes of coming to her or her parents - only, now that the girl was dead, an explanation seemed inevitable.

Respectively, the house: 1399 Ross St. Lane, a well kept property on a thin scratch of road over which scenic trees hung. It was a good house, an addition that came after Ainsley, who was born in a trailer park. Schuman left the jeep parked on the street and went up the clean steps and knocked on the front door. Five minutes later, having received no response, she knocked again. At this time of day both Robert and Melinda should have been in. If they knew who she was they would be interested to speak with her. All she had to do was get someone to the door. She knocked again.

Someone closed a car door. "Hey." She looked back. A large woman in a blouse stared from across the road. "sh*t, leave those poor folks alone."

Schuman kicked in the door. It flew off its hinges and slammed down the dark hall. She entered and listened. Nothing. "Hello," she called. She stepped into a grey waiting room with blankets and magazines and junk strewn in disarray. Dog droppings rolled underfoot, hard as steel. Further on was a living room, also lifeless, a bedroom, a bathroom, stairs.

She ascended. The junk unfurled here, the second floor variously Melinda's haunt and a warehouse for Robert's acquisitions and tools. There was also an unexpected sense of dissonance. Schuman didn't have to look very long. One of the bedrooms exuded dullness, weight without mass. A moment of pause belied an acrid stench.

Schuman transformed. She went up to the door and hunched over her cane and listened to silence. She wouldn't consider it. No mourning went on in this house, not for a girl who left. Schuman was not naive enough to believe that these people cared.

She opened the door into near total darkness. There was only one wraith, hanging over a vague bed-shape, its leech maw gaping down at something small.

Schuman's blood curled. She raised her cane as it moaned toward her and the tip opened and boomed into flame. The wraith fell into itself as Schuman walked very quickly to the bed, whatever it was waddled in white blankets stained blackgreen with rot, she tore them away and found a small body eaten near to the bones.

She. She walked away from the bed, she squeezed her eyes shut for a while. Then she walked back and took it in again.

No. Fur? She took a closer look. Curled legs, a tiny snout…

Schuman pulled the blankets back and went downstairs. She sat in the living room. She skimmed a bad magazine. Now that she thought she hadn't even seen a car. Media call. They might be back in five hours.

Two policemen eventually entered the living room. Schuman got up and both of them winced as she detransformed. She walked out, and they followed, and out there on the porch they were barely able to get her in handcuffs and guide her to the idling patrol car in the street.

She spent indeterminate hours in the small local police department, waiting at a desk, relieved of her bonds as she entered the door. Nothing more decisive could be expected. At around midday a grey, wide sheriff took her to the waiting room and two more Magical Girls, Danville and Ratke, looking truly sour. Schuman followed them to what must have been the same humvee. They left Macon, heading towards Savannah.

"Do you have any idea how much of a problem you're being," said Danville a few minutes in. She had no official bearing left, tired and sullen. "I don't care about your personal crisis. Have you thought of the damage? Sticky f*cking fingers in the business of Magical Girls everywhere. You make us look like a joke."

"Many of us are."

Danville sucked in her lips. "Okay, Schuman. Just tell me, if you don't believe, why are you here?"

Schuman shrugged. The question didn't pertain, basically. How could you not believe, when it was a matter of basic facts? It would only be accurate to say that, in the course of belief, she found something comparable to guilt. It wasn't actually guilt, nothing so pithy. But a sensation of acceleration, malformation at the core, ballooning out beyond control…

Danville dug a cigarette out of her uniform. She didn't light it but stuck it in her mouth. "Fine. You just have to sit back. Nobody's taking this away, not Kyubey, not no one. You just do what you need to do."

Which sounded fair.

They dropped her off at the same hotel. Danville gave her the key to the same room. "Stay here until it's time to leave," she said. "It's a lot better that way."

A new, crisp uniform was laid out across the mattress. Schuman changed and folded up the old clothes at the foot of the bed. She then lay ramrod straight so as to stare at the ceiling.

There was never a better Magical Girl for the task. Georgia was precious in a way she uniquely understood, privileged with space to nurse her truth, time to let it take root. Less fortunate girls, Georgia girls, mangled Atlanta with careless battles and unnatural divisions, only worsened by their reptilian descendants. Under Schuman's necessary crusade, the rest might fare a little better. More time for implementation, Savannah smoothly under lock, and…

Now it went to someone else. Nentwig, if they didn't insert some putz. But Nentwig couldn't do it like it needed to be done, survivalist that she was, sure to secure a hollow, technical victory, infested with outside actors, shying from the root…and Schuman in dark Alaska, herself insipidly working toward no conclusion, trapped where she could not care…

Unable to sleep, she dug out her phone. Nentwig's text asked if she wanted to meet.Yes,she responded.Meet me at Stewart.

When she left the hotel the next morning she found a familiar Malibu at the nearest parking place to the door. She tested it, it was unlocked. She got inside. Nentwig, hunched over in the passenger seat wearing bad business clothes, blearily yawned and rubbed her eyes.

They drove to a relatively secluded office space downtown, an entire building bought out for USMF use, one of several. Ordinarily it was clustered with cars belonging to other USMF members, but the premises were empty when they arrived. They assumed an office space. Spread on a long plastic table was a collection of food, primarily fries, also a box of grief cubes and some fruit. They took chairs. Though Nentwig immediately began to examine the food, she didn't go so far as to raise it to her mouth. "So."

"How did this happen."

"Archon." She reclined in her chair and shrugged. "Essentially the entire building became a miasma. Too many dead to count, more than the official number." She shrugged again. "Not your fault? They were already unstable. But you know how it looks."

Schuman found an apple to hold. "How many dead?"

"Seven. Peckenpaugh, Carrarro, Higgins. The other four were from South Carolina and Florida. Then plus the Savannah girls. So actually eleven."

"A disaster."

"The worst in a while."

"I think this is the end of happiness."

Nentwig laughed. "Wow. Yeah, well. There's all kinds of rumblings. Centralization you know. Let's be honest, I'm in favor."

Schuman ate of her apple.

"I mean, who said we should be independent, like, at all? Didn't we learn from Kyubey how sh*tty we are?"

Schuman leaned forward and caught Nentwig' wandering eyes. "Tell me you'll look after Georgia."

"What?" Nentwig frowned. "That's not really my thing, sorry. I mean that's not my purview."

"Then tell the others. When you succeed you need to have a thing worth keeping. Explain it that way."

"Okay," said Nentwig, "well, sure."

"Tell them I am not an unbeliever. Tell them that I am still fighting."

"Keep in mind you could text them. Sure, okay." Nentwig grimaced and finally commenced to bite a fry, which she swallowed immediately. "That's all then. That's all?"

Schuman nodded.

Nentwig got up. "You don't mind just heading to the base?"

Schuman didn't.

Clouds drew over the sky. A chill wind washed the air with uniform greyness of complexion, imparting the texture of watery ash onto everything.

Schuman, waiting for the plane to start. It was six-thirty and someone had told her they were to leave at six. The pilots scurried around their massive cargo craft, glaring at her like she might flag them away from their important business. Unlikely. Directed here, she could do nothing but stand and run the numbers. In a few hours minimum, you will be heading four thousand miles from your current location. Four thousand miles they are bringing you for your express purpose. Barring divine intervention, there you will stay.

She'd shaped her hair and uniform for the moment of departure, and now the wind sent both into disarray, a failure that was itself pointless. Nobody paid attention anymore. Schuman herself couldn't. She felt infantile, helpless but to await the next moment of consequence.

Kyubey appeared from under the plane, unseen by the technicians.Are you in a mood to talk, Miss Schuman?

Why?

I wanted to wish you luck! I probably won't be talking with you much in the future, so now is the time.

Is that so.

Mhm! While the situation in Alaska is indeed complicated, it isn't in need of very much control, since there are few local Magical Girls to contend with. You wouldn't be sent there otherwise!

Schuman nodded.And you let this happen.

He twined unseen between a technician's legs.Perhaps you mean the archon? It was beyond my control, unfortunately. As for the previous Savannah girls, they should have been incredibly weak. I'm as confused about that as you are.

You know something.

You should focus on your work in Alaska.

Schuman closed her eyes. Well, wasn't he right? Would learning anything help? Work in Alaska. Move on.

That was all. She felt at peace.Thank you, Kyubey.

Of course.

She opened her eyes. He was gone. The technicians swirled with greater speed. One called her over as he budged along, pale in the face, skin stretched. She took a ladder up the side and settled into the hollow of the plane. It was beginning to drizzle, the air accumulating layers. In one of the few tiny windows the techs jogged away, covering their heads. The engines started in an intracellular rumble. The plane taxied. It sped up and began to gain air, the ground parting off, and as it finally disconnected a howling wind sent it uncomfortably tilting, and the metal creaked, and the windows darkened until almost black.

They breached. The plane leveled out. Sunlight.

Chapter 9: Credits

Chapter Text

1. Carew, Thomas. "To Saxham".

2. Sidney, Philip.Astrophel and Stella.

3. Flaubert, Gustave.Madame Bovary.

4. Johnson, Ben. "To the Immortal Memory and Friendship of That Noble Pair, Sir Lucius Cary and Sir H. Morrison".

5. The Bhagavad Gita.

6. Shakar, Alex.The Savage Girl.

7. –

8. Conrad, Joseph.The Heart of Darkness.