starstar97: im doing a stupid little dance on my bed rn
moth30: lighthouse?
starstar97: opal did a video for me aaaaaaaaaaaaaa
moth30: hell yeah
ebi-furai: nice of her
ebi-furai: wanna fill them in on how things have been going for you, ez?
ezzen: uhhhhhhh
ezzen: Not much to report. Doing paperwork.
Why was she prompting me? Just being social, or was this a roundabout and subtle form of bullying?
ezzen: Really weird to spend so long off my PC.
skychicken: oh, yeah, i assume you’ve got to basically move into a new place?
skychicken: new computer and so on
No acknowledgment of my apology or question from last night. That stung. Was this bridge burned?
ezzen: Yep, wound up living with the Radiances, doing some shopping today.
ezzen: Which is just unreal when I actually say it.
starstar97: jealous forever. FOREVER, e
starstar97: currently too high on this video to make demands but later im going to want the hot gossip
starstar97: ebi has been SO uncooperative >:(
ebi-furai: no leaks!
ebi-furai: i like my job too much
ezzen: Yeah, no leaks. I’m already a burden sorta since they’re covering everything about my foot, don’t want to cause further problems.
ezzen: My post earlier ruffled some feathers for their publicity.
starstar97: fine
ks3glimmer: im very lost in this conversation
starstar97: btw tysm ily this is the best day of my life
ezzen: <3
ks3glimmer: i go afk for three days and i come back to ezzen living
ks3glimmer: with LIGHTHOUSE? correct me if im wrong. bizarro world if im not
ks3glimmer: also hey new person who im inferring from context is a lighthouse employee
ebi-furai: ww hii
skychicken: our first Todai employee in this chat, i think
That claim still smelled a bit fishy to me.
ebi-furai: check the forum, still top post i think
ezzen: ^
We’d been collectively fielding questions about the news of my new situation from latecomers all morning, both in the chatroom and on the forum. It was what occupied most of my otherwise-empty past two hours of following Opal around Tochou like a lonely duckling. We’d gotten a respectable portion of the immigration paperwork done; most importantly, Opal had successfully submitted some critical documents on Todai’s end regarding sponsoring my visa, and we’d managed to dodge any difficulties regarding the fact that my method of entering the country had been via counter-abduction by Hina. She had allegedly teleported me in eighty-kilometer hops all the way across the world—some seven thousand meters up—which had caused significant distress to air traffic control in every jurisdiction between Heathrow and Haneda. Opal had assured me that Todai had already paid the according fines—apparently those made up the vast majority of the final bill for my rescue and recovery, compared to the actual medical costs or the fees associated with immigration. The number was large enough that she refused to reveal it to me, citing that it’d make me feel unreasonably guilty even though it was entirely Hina’s fault. She was probably right.
We’d relocated once during our bouncing between different lines and kiosks, claimed a new unofficial home base of lightly padded seats and tables that were slightly too small for our bureaucratic labors. At least this new location was by a window, and the view was decent up here on the twenty-fifth floor—did Japan have a thing for floor-to-ceiling windows? Surprisingly, the concrete terrain of lower rooftops was peppered with what looked to be gardens despite the fact that most of those buildings were minor local government offices sheltering in Tochou’s shadow. It did a lot to liven up the euclidean blocks of concrete, like the park had on the drive over.
I’d taken this all in across the span of a few seconds. Then I’d had to stop looking; too high off the ground. Opal had spotted that—without comment, mercifully—and opted to instead describe the scene to me, which had metamorphosed into some rambling tangent about how the city’s juxtaposition of urban construction and green space was a particularly Japanese sensibility. It had gone over my head, only half-paying attention with my focus split between the chatroom and the documents, but it seemed to keep her occupied while her eyes scanned through the endless sheafs of red tape. Indeed, her spirits had remained quite high through the whole thing, energy unflagging—though that might have also had something to do with the steady supply of nuts being transferred from pocketspace to her stomach.
By square footage, Tochou was over eight times the size of Lighthouse Tower, and while our adventures had been constrained to a select few floors, there’d still been a surprising amount of walking, agitating my ankle. Fortunately, the ice pack had done its job, muting the joint’s fussing, until it had finally reached thermal equilibrium with the stuffy, ink- and paper-laden air. It was maybe a degree warmer in here than I would have liked, and I’d absentmindedly been tapping my fingers against the window to compensate, leaching the excess heat into the chilly glass. That also helped remind me that there was a barrier between me and the long drop.
I silently thanked the spent pack of mysterious blue gel—not nearly as blue as Hina’s eyes, a slightly disquieting thought—and handed it back to Opal, who deposited it into her personal pocketspace. I distracted myself the only way I knew how.
“How much space have you got in there?”
“Four cubic meters. Two by two by one. Handy, isn’t it?”
“Extremely.” I was a little jealous. “It’s just {VOLUME}, isn’t it? The space itself?”
“Pretty much. Hina’s is fancier than mine; she uses it for everything. Hates carrying stuff.”
“She can portal too, right? Saw her do it last night.”
The mention of her teammate’s objectionable behavior set Opal’s expression just the tiniest bit stormy before she shook it off.
“Yep. Space is her specialty, you could say. Easier when you’re halfway to having a lattice for a brain.”
Opal had done a formidable job of filing away the documents not intended for return to whichever helpful clerk had presented them to us, banishing them into an accordion folder with different labeled sections—immigration, health insurance, Bureau. Opal had made an attempt to teach me the Japanese term for each of those and scribbled them onto the back of each of the little label tabs as though they were flashcards. In turn, the folder was relegated to her pocketspace to join the spent ice pack and her dwindling supply of nuts and whatever else she had in there.
Then she stood, stretching, tail raised and midriff on display. The word ‘fanservice’ wandered through my brain, which I tried very hard to ignore. I almost succeeded. She rolled her shoulders and encouraged me to do the same, eyeing how I distributed my weight as I rose. She cracked all her knuckles—loud in the hush of the byzantine labyrinth, though no louder than her own voice had been while rambling about some shrine in Akasaka—and then surprised me by continuing the crackling up her arms and then down her spine, even getting some loud pops from her tail as she flexed it.
“Nnghm. My back is killing me—these chairs are really not great for my spine. Feel up to going up to the skydeck, stretch our legs?”
“We’re done for today?”
“Just about. It’s—” She checked her watch, an ultra-thin hologram display more like a bracelet in form. At least four hundred quid, I guessed. “Quarter to noon, and if we do another ticket-wait-forms cycle, I won’t have enough buffer time to drop you off and eat something before my meeting. Skydeck will probably only be…twenty minutes at most, I think.”
The rhythm of Opal’s day seemed to be heavily influenced by the supernaturally high demands of her stomach; meals were the immovable keystones around which she assembled the rest of her itinerary.
“Um…sure, we can go up. How high is it?”
I tried to keep the question nonchalant, but it came out a bit too breathless, and she caught on, glancing out the window I’d been studiously avoiding once I’d had all I could take of the view.
“Not good with heights, yeah?”
“Um…not great, but I can manage,” I assured her. “It’s not as bad once I go high enough, so…”
She nodded. “You should be alright, I think. It’s nowhere near as tall as Skytree, but it’s still…two hundred meters, I think? Something like that.”
I considered this. I didn’t want to refuse the offer, so I swallowed my nerves.
“Okay.”
Her voice softened. “If you think you can’t, just let me know, alright?”
“…thanks.”
She really was entirely too kind. That feeling only intensified under her watchful gaze as I shuffled my feet experimentally, confirming that my leg was up to some more walking. Satisfied with that, she led me over to the elevators she had indicated. When one arrived, both of the people who stepped out—employees, probably—directed a round-eyed, starstruck stare at her. She gave them a warm smile, seeming not at all awkward under the attention, before leading me inward. The doors slid shut.
“I’m a little surprised that a Spire-lover like you would be scared of heights. You’ve never been, right?”
“No, but I think it’d be like a plane. Once I go high enough, I stop thinking of it in terms of distance from the ground.”
“Makes sense. You’ll get over it, I think. It’s a lot less scary once you realize how much control you’ve got in the air. Er—that’s how it is for our mantles, anyway. I wouldn’t recommend jumping off any buildings, yourself.”
Was there a silent “not yet” appended to that? I didn’t want to tempt that possibility, as much as I was coming to trust Opal to not push me in that direction.
“That’s…{IMPEL}? Can we talk about this now?”
“We can, since it’s just us. When we’re mantled, it’s…well, not just {IMPEL}, there’s a lot of tricks. Blue ripple, though, yeah.”
Blue was physical effects—forces, changes in temperature.
“It’s not snapweaving?”
“It’s bindings. Jet fighter cockpit sort of vibes, remember? The mantles sort of come…preloaded with the glyphs, woven into the manifest, so they’re acting as LM substrate for extra bindings. You know how all you have to do with your binding is tug on the weave? Same deal, but even more natural. If you’ve ever played an instrument, or a video game with a lot of hand-eye coordination, it’s like that.”
I had largely stayed away from video games that demanded that sort of dexterity, owing to my right hand, but I wasn’t about to derail into that when we were finally talking about my favorite thing.
“So what you can do is limited by what you’ve included in the mantle.”
“Sort of. We still can snapweave for other stuff, but that’s not the same either. When your body itself is spun out of lattice, it’s…I don’t know how to put it. You’re much more aware of the ripple directly. Psychomotive elements go both ways, you understand. Though we’re still ‘on instruments’ for a lot of maneuvers, so to speak.”
I considered this.
“Even if it’s not totally fluid, that still sounds…” Then I wound up being a little more vulnerable than I had intended. “Freeing.”
“Yeah.” She sighed. “It is.”
The elevator dinged, and we were at the deck. There were few internal lights on, but the huge windows encircling the space let in the skylight, the hazy blue casting everything in its hue. Like the penthouse, the elevator was at the building’s center—or rather, this tower’s center. Tochou had two peaks that rose above the more conventional office building design of the first thirty-ish floors, and both had a skydeck; we were on the northern one. Opal led me forward to the window which circumnavigated the entire deck, continuing to keep an eye on my leg; not that I was limping, but the concern was welcome nonetheless. I made it to the window and needed a moment for my eyes to adjust from the relative shade to the light of the open sky. Then I saw Tokyo’s true scale for the first time.
The city just…kept going, in every direction, a sprawl of grey and brown mottling that extended into the hazy distance, blending into the foot of distant blue mountains which in turn melded with the midday sky. Skyscrapers broke the cobbled surface, jutting out in protrusions that were sometimes conventional rectangles and sometimes more esoteric and bulbous. Most were smaller than Tochou, but a few were of the level or even taller, kin to the behemoths that shared Todai’s neighborhood. We were facing the wrong way anyway, but I would have been completely unable to pick Lighthouse Tower out from the undergrowth. There was an especially tall, needle-like building ahead of us, a mile or two away.
“That’s…Skytree?”
“Yep. Fourth-tallest manmade structure in the world, these days.”
A little placard set in front of the part of the window which faced Skytree helpfully listed the competition. The tallest structure in the world was obviously the Spire, by an entire order of magnitude, 8,070 meters…but it didn’t count for this metric, as it wasn’t manmade. Thus, the actual crown went to an 800-meter super-skyscraper that had been erected as an exercise in magic-assisted architecture in Shanghai, closely followed by its sibling in Guangzhou. Then came the tallest non-magical one from the previous era, Merdeka 118 in Kuala Lumpur, right above Skytree on the list. Previously, those two had been behind the Burj Khalifa, but that had been annihilated with the rest of Dubai.
I made the mistake of looking past the little informational rectangle, down toward the ground far below the observation deck’s windows. Too high—I squeezed my eyes shut. That was a second mistake, because now my body was convinced I was standing on the edge of a cliff, with nothing between me and the ground. My heart pounded, my mouth dry and sticky. My panicking mind groped for some security. I found it in my binding—
Opal’s hand gripped my wrist, fingers pressed over the tattoo. The lattice wouldn’t budge—she wasn’t just holding my arm in place, she was also using her Flame to hold the thread taut, preventing me from tugging the leading edge to call the weapon from the binding, just as Hina had. I didn’t at all appreciate that echo, and the panic deepened further for a moment, recalling the primal terror she had evoked in me—
“Not here. Deep breaths.”
My brain was screaming danger. I was going to fall, down and down, and become a wet smear on the pavement. Like—
“Too high,” I blubbered.
“Let go of the lattice, it’s okay. Deep breaths, Ezzen. Kuu…fah. Like that.”
I forced myself to take a shuddering breath. This was humiliating—and became more so when I heard Opal say something in Japanese to a passerby or maybe the staff. I squeezed my eyes tighter. I squeaked out an apology, hating the scene I was making.
“I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be. Do you need to go back down?”
I didn’t want to. I didn’t want to lose to my body’s stupid response to a bad memory. Stupid fucking useless spear, what would it have even done for me? No, don’t think about that, just breathe in, breathe out. A lattice diagram began to take form in my mind. It would start with {AFFIX}, and blue link into {IMPEL} to resist the force of gravity, or a {DEFLECT} sheet to create sufficient drag. Alternatively, I could {TRANSPOSE} the momentum itself into some other color of ripple, though some napkin math on kinetic energy ruled that out as a matter of externalities that most VNT groups would deem unacceptable, regardless of which color I were to choose. There was one neat line there where you linked on orange into a {COMPOSE} to just directly store the energy into a binding for later release, but you’d need a proper receptacle ahead of time, which—
Picturing the glyphs that would arrest my fall helped me calm down. My heartbeat settled, and I released my mental hold on the lattice in my arm.
“I’m okay.”
“Look at the mountains instead.”
I opened my eyes, looking out at the blue peaks bordering the horizon instead of straight down. Opal didn’t release my wrist until I took a few more slow breaths. Then my gaze tracked to her.
“How do you…oh. Amethyst.”
“Yuuka, not Amane,” she corrected, her voice gentle.
“…Doesn’t she have a jetbike?”
“She insisted on learning.”
There was a quiet smile in her voice that stabilized me. I unclenched my fists, forced myself to un-hunch my stance. I wasn’t going to let the memories rule me.
“Okay. Sorry, again. Can we keep going?”
“Yes. If you need to go down—just ask. I won’t let it become a scene.”
Thank you, Opal. I wished I could have said that aloud, but the whole ordeal had made me a bit fragile as it was. She took me around the perimeter, going toward the west side, and pointed.
“Fuji-san.”
The snow-capped peak was visible over the row of smaller mountains in the far distance. This direction also had fewer skyscrapers, making the buildings seem like pebbles on a beach by comparison. There was majesty in the mountain, even at this distance—I pictured the Spire next to it, over twice as tall but far more narrow, less vast for all its height. Nature had a way of eclipsing even the work of the divine. On the other hand, the endless urban sprawl below me, the fruit of centuries of labor from us mortals, had less than a fifth of the Spire’s population. Wait, no, not centuries; at some point in Opal’s architectural rambling she had mentioned that not much of the old city had survived the firebombings during the Second World War.
“Isn’t san an honorific? Personification?”
“No, just a homophone. It’s a good friend of ours, though, so maybe. We’ll take you, eventually.”
“On a hike?”
That sounded sort of nice; the slopes seemed gentle enough that they probably wouldn’t trigger my acrophobia. It’d have to be after my foot healed completely, though. Opal chuckled.
“Well, it’s a bit more than a hike—it’s a pretty serious ascent. For humans.”
“And for…us?”
It still made me giddy to refer to myself that way and mean it. No longer fantasy. She pointed at the distant peak.
“Three minutes, twenty-nine seconds.”
“Flying straight up? Or is it more like running?”
“Oh, no, not the ascent. From here to the summit. That’s the average between us.”
Another placard helpfully informed me that that was a roughly 80-kilometer journey—she let me use my phone’s calculator for a minute. The speed wound up being a little over Mach one.
“I assume that sort of statistic is under…NDA?”
Aside from our discussion of Todai’s less-than-cordial relationship with the PCTF, Opal had been a little cagey about exactly what was and wasn’t considered ‘safely public’ knowledge regarding the Radiances. She’d assured me that we’d talk it through once the paperwork caught up to us.
“Well, that specific number is public, or I wouldn’t have said it, but that’s a good assumption.”
I took a photo of the vista for Star’s benefit—hopefully she still had an appetite for souvenirs from me after Opal’s video—and mentally filed away the factoid. We continued around the perimeter, and she finally broached the topic I had hoped she’d continue to avoid.
“How are your bites?”
“Er—bitten, I suppose?”
“I mean emotionally.”
“Must we?” It felt a little forceful of her to be bringing this up after the emotional ordeal not three minutes ago.
“Mm. We don’t have to, just felt I should get it on the table. I understand you two agreed it’s not a date, but…”
Was she asking if I was into Hina? Because the answer to that was a resigned and faintly horrified yes, you have no idea how much, but there was no way I was going to admit that—especially not in public, even with the respectful wide-ish berth that other tourists were giving us. So I stuck with my story.
“It’s not a date.”
“Okay, fine, sorry, didn’t mean to be a bother.” She fell silent for a moment, and then almost burst out, unable to stop herself from continuing the line of questioning. “Then—what do you think of her? I mean—she’s my biggest worry about all this, you know? I just fret she’ll scare you off. I want this to work.”
What did I think of Hina, exactly? I still felt last night’s resolve that she was entirely, unapologetically herself, more than anything else—but that understanding had come about through too much intimacy for me to feel comfortable sharing it. Besides, that was a tautologically unhelpful framing of her character, and I had to admit some curiosity about what Opal would think of my previous theory instead.
“She’s like…a puppy, sometimes. But sometimes she’s a hyena?”
Fuck, that sounded stupid, said aloud. I was powerless to stop the blush from invading my face. She stifled a snicker, which made me feel even worse, and flayed me open with a giggle-laced conspiratorial whisper.
“A hyena! Hina the Hyena. Like a certain Heron, isn’t it?”
Oh no. Oh fuck. Was that why I had categorized her like that? If I had been somewhat embarrassed before, this was now all-out humiliation, as she dragged my subconscious predilection toward Heung into the harsh light of day. She continued poking holes in the metaphor, a teasing grin on her face.
“Hyenas aren’t really scary, are…they…?” She trailed off as she processed my reaction. Her voice softened. “Oh, I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean to make fun of you. Sorry.”
I tried to defend the idea, even though it had already taken on far too much water and I really had no reason to be invested in it anymore. “It’s just—how she smiles. The teeth.”
“Yes, I see it, it’s really not a bad comparison at all. That was so rude of me, I don’t…no excuse here, that was just out of turn. Um…can I make it up to you with some insider intel?”
My metaphorical ears perked up.
“Go ahead?”
“She likes crepes. There’s a place on Takeshita-dori called, uh…Sweet Box. She’s probably going to hint for you to take her there when you pass by. At least, I’m assuming that’s the part of town she’s going to take you to.”
That caught me off guard—I had pegged her tastes as more carnivorous, not quite so sweet and girly.
“Crepes?”
“Crepes.”
“And she wouldn’t just…drag me there directly?”
“She’s capable of subtlety, you know. To use the dog metaphor…she’ll beg a bit. Look at it, then look back to you, that sort of thing.”
“Doesn’t sound all that subtle.”
“I didn’t say she was good at it, just capable of it. It’s cute, though, I promise.”
“Okay, um. Thanks. Um—apology accepted?”
Awkward, but functional, and my appreciation was genuine. Opal and Hina had both intimated that they were each other’s best friends, or something close to it, and being let in on that felt good.
We fell silent as we continued around the perimeter. The view directly to the south was partially blocked by the south tower with its twin observation deck, some twenty-odd meters away from us. The main thing of note in that direction was that the mountains tapered off as they met the bay. It occurred to me—
“That’s the Pacific.”
“It…is? Of course.” She nodded hesitantly, before snapping her fingers in understanding. I’d have only seen the Atlantic while living in Britain, and Philadelphia had been inland. “Oh, first time?”
“Um…probably not first first, I think my dad took me to California once or twice when I was little, but I don’t remember it.”
“Ah. Well, there it is. Behold.”
I did as told, casting my gaze out at the horizon; there wasn’t actually all that much to behold from this vantage point. It was just a lot of water. In the sky, however—
“That’s the scar.”
“Yep. Right mess. Not our proudest moment.”
The sky above the city—specifically above the port, to the southeast—had a section that was discolored and jagged. It was an ugly yellowish grey against the otherwise-blue sky. It almost looked like the ripple warping on my spear; I supposed that made sense. There were other landmarks further inland in this direction, like what looked to be the Imperial Palace, but the scar was a rather new addition to the skyline.
“Smaller than I expected.”
“It’s bigger up close.”
There was a placard for this, as well. I already knew the gist, but I gave the English portion a read anyway.
Visible above Tokyo Harbor is the Blue Spark Scar, a magical effect created on 27 July, 2018, after the Blue Spark Incident, where Lighthouse defeated a monster summoned by a necromancer.
“Sparse, isn’t it.”
“Yeah, it doesn’t even mention the fireworks.” She squinted at the placard. “The Japanese does.”
Wait. “July 2018. So that’s—three and a half years ago. You mentioned that, um, Sugahara…”
“Sugawara. Yes, it’s connected. Our first mission as an official team that wasn’t just inferno control. Topic for later, you understand.”
First time they had fought Hikanome—a name suspiciously absent from the placard. This wasn’t something we should continue discussing in public. We followed the circle to the final cardinal direction of our circumnavigation, facing east. She pointed downward.
“You don’t have to look, but that’s Shinjuku. One of the biggest city centers in…well, the whole world, really. Even the station is practically a city in its own right.”
I braved it—but when my gaze fell closer than a certain distance, I suddenly became aware again of how high off the ground we were and had to abandon the effort. What I had seen of it looked—frankly, pretty much exactly like the rest of the city. Maybe with a slightly higher density of skyscrapers, but if there was something specific she had wanted me to see, it either wasn’t visible from up here or I hadn’t looked carefully enough.
“Can’t,” I apologized.
“It’s okay. Honestly—yeah, not much to see of it from up here, is there? You’ll get it once you’re down there.” She winced. “Oof, I can’t imagine my first real exposure to the crowds being with Hina of all people. Uh—well, you’re committed, and I promised I wouldn’t keep questioning that. So…good luck?”
—
We left Tochou the same way we came in, through the front, first descending those two hundred meters down to ground level—two different elevator rides—and then through the labyrinth of lines and halls on the ground level. The skydeck had been full of tourists, but we’d been almost entirely left alone; there were more interesting things to look at than Opal. But down here in the maw of the bureaucratic beast, her shining hair and massive tail were by far the most attention-grabbing things to see, turning the heads of visitors and paper-pushers alike. The eyes that fell on me by association were becoming more and more unwelcome; she was long since inoculated to it, though.
“Okay, so—Hina’s going to meet you somewhere else, and in the interest of her privacy, I’m not actually going to hand you off to her directly.”
“I’m already, er, seen with you already, though.”
“Yeah, but she’s a bit…paranoid about it. She’s already, uh…” She lowered her voice, rolling her eyes, “Undercover.”
“Is that…a lack of faith in her disguise, or just that it’s not—” Too many eyes on me to dare use the Japanese without risk of embarrassment. “—magical girl?”
“The latter. Scamp can disappear completely when she wants. Besides, word about how you look won’t spread fast enough to catch up to you today, at least, not once the two of you disappear into the crowds.”
“Oh.” That somehow made it worse; it hadn’t quite occurred to me that celebrity-spotters on social media might make note of my appearance and spread it around. But if they were anything like Star—indeed, some of them might be people Star knew—my face was already destined to be cataloged into the weekly rumor mill surrounding the Radiances, just by being seen here with Opal today. “I’m going to be hunted down by paparazzi?”
“Well, the professionals know better than to mob us, but by next week there’s at least some chance of fans recognizing you, yeah. If that’s a problem…well, Hina will talk you through it.”
I didn’t relish the idea of being high-profile enough to garner attention from passersby in public even without a Radiance at my side—that was some small part of why I had rejected the idea of joining as a Radiance in the first place, secondary to the more obvious objections. Even the idea of my face eventually becoming joined publicly to my identity as Ezzen sat deeply wrong with me. I valued the near-perfect anonymity I had cultivated online; I’d managed to achieve a strange limbo between being popular and respected while remaining mostly private, and now that was being threatened.
“But it won’t come up today?”
“Shouldn’t. Rumor mill doesn’t work that fast. Er—sorry. I should have explained it more back when I made you the offer.”
“I’ll manage,” I sighed.
She winced a bit, which in turn made me feel bad for making her feel bad that I felt bad. We were great at this. She shook it off and led me the rest of the way out the building, and then around the corner to where we had street-parked—how humble. When we reached the car, I turned and looked again at Tochou’s facade, now just far enough away that I wouldn’t lose my balance trying to look up at it.
Somebody with a proper appreciation for architecture would have probably gotten more out of it, but Tochou cut an impressive figure nonetheless. It gave the impression of two huge columns stitched together in the middle until about halfway up, beyond which the two towers continued to rise individually, holding higher-level offices and the twin skydecks. The stone facade was a fortress of bureaucracy, with the two turrets standing sentinel above the keep, the entrance set in as though to shield it from assault. It felt as though it should have a drawbridge or portcullis or something, rather than the array of perfectly normal glass doors. Too, craning my neck up at the dual peaks adorned with satellite dishes, I almost expected to see them crowned with vast anti-aircraft guns watching the sky, perhaps trained on the scar. That mental image, of artillery atop great stone monoliths, came from a childhood trip to see the concrete flak towers in Vienna—a historical site that had fared WW2 far better than this city supposedly had. Those enormous slabs of concrete had long since been denuded of their armaments, which had been disappointing to ten-year-old Dalton at the time. Now, my imagination filled in the absence with the Spire’s own defensive emplacements and dropped the whole amalgam of concrete and cutting-edge cannonry onto the top of each of Tochou’s spires.
But no such weapons were necessary; the scar was inert, stitched shut and scabbed over. Anything that threatened this city would have to go through the Radiances, anyway.
Opal looked up with me. “View’s fine from down here?”
“…Thanks. I guess it is sort of scary, in a more abstract way. Feels like if you stare long enough you might fall up into it, y’know?”
She gave me a funny look. “Can’t say I do.”
I retreated into my jacket a bit at that, casting my gaze back down to Earth, the blush warring with the chilly air attacking my skin. My arms, the left of which had been absentmindedly squeezing the right to help fight off the winter’s ache, separated and delved into my pockets. Seeing my reaction, she cursed.
“Ah, bollocks. I feel every third thing I say makes you uncomfortable in some way. Sorry.”
I wanted to tell her it wasn’t her fault, because it really wasn’t, but I was shutting down a bit. My ears were replaying the stupid thing I had said over and over, my mind unable to buffer anything past the moment of embarrassment. Instead, it harkened back to the humiliating scene I had made earlier up on the skydeck, and the idea that more people would be looking at me from now on, my undersocialized, probably-autistic constant awkwardness on global display, to say nothing of how I was going to make a fool of myself with Hina, it was all this awful paralytic pressure—
“Oh, Ezzen. It’s not—it doesn’t have to be scary. You know I didn’t get good at talking to people overnight, right?”
I still didn’t respond verbally, trapped in the cycle of overstimulation and bad thoughts, but I managed the tiniest nod to indicate I was listening. She circled from my side to stand in front of me on the pavement. She probably cut an impressive figure with Tochou at her back, the kind you’d see on a postcard or the cover of a magazine, but all I saw from my downcast gaze and hunched shoulders were her trainers. They looked expensive, a splatter of soft pinks and baby blues and citrine yellows over pure white; the same hues that refracted across her scales, so maybe the shoes were custom.
“Remember what Hina said this morning? How I used to be a hikikomori? A shut-in?”
I actually hadn’t. I managed a noncommittal noise of acknowledgment.
“Well, it’s true. I was…I wanted the publicity, to be seen as a mahou shoujo, but I was terrified. Could barely form a complete sentence in front of people, and that was in my school uniform, not my transformation. If I ever went anywhere, it was because Hina dragged me there, or because I didn’t want Ai to spend time alone. Took me a long time to, er, ‘get it together’. You’ve—really splashed right into the deep end with all this and…what I said earlier about the Peacies probably made it sound like you’re on a timer to do the same. But you’re not, okay?”
She stepped a bit closer to me, but I still couldn’t raise my eyes to her.
“You’re not. You don’t—it’s really, really hard at first. But it’s just practice, and we don’t bite.” She made a dissatisfied noise. “Well, I suppose Hina does. The point is, if you don’t want to be in the public eye with the rest of us beyond your name, we can make that happen. And I promise, a year from now, it’ll be so much easier to just…exist. To not be embarrassed to be you. It just takes practice. Want to know what helped for me?”
“What?”
“I…gosh, it sounds a bit dumb when I say it out loud. I took an improv acting class. It’s one of the best decisions I ever made—okay, well, Hina threatened me at knifepoint to do it, but it’s still true. And at some point, the embarrassment just…became normal, yeah? It didn’t go away, I just got better at ignoring it to keep playing the role, learned to think on my feet even when my metaphorical arse was out. And when I started being Radiance Opal, and not Alice…I was still playing a role, until it became real. More than figuring out our costumes or anything else, more than anything aside from getting flametouched, pretending is what let me really become mahou shoujo. Again, not saying you have to follow in those exact footsteps, just…”
“…so it is roleplay.”
She guffawed at that. “Yes, it is, in this sense. It’s performative. But no more performative than any other public interaction. It’s all tatemae. Um, I’m getting off track—that’ll have to be a whole lecture on its own, eventually, but the point is: just try. I won’t tell you to not be embarrassed. Just try to…keep up the act, pretend you’re somebody who’s confident. You’ll mess up, and that’s fine, because while Hina’s real queer, she’s basically the perfect person to practice that sort of thing with because she’ll never make fun of you for making an effort. Okay? Can you do that?”
“…okay.”
“Attaboy.” She patted my shoulder gently—my left, so as not to put more weight on my bad leg, which I appreciated—then dug the stabilizer out of her bag and handed it to me. “This is yours. Feeling up to walking a hundred meters on your own?”
“Um. Think so?” I accepted it from her, rolling the bulky shape around in my hands before pocketing it in my jacket. It unbalanced me slightly, but that was a small price to pay for being able to walk at all. Then I processed the rest of what she was saying; I hadn’t quite realized we were to part ways right here on the pavement. She was just going to set me loose in an unfamiliar city and hope that I linked up with the right person, who was supposedly in disguise? I didn’t even have Hina’s number, which seemed like a bit of an oversight. This seemed like a bad plan, and while I didn’t say it aloud, my frown spoke for itself.
“Don’t worry,” she assured me, pointing over my shoulder. “Just follow the road. She’ll find you before too long. She’s already around here somewhere, actually, so it’s not like you’ll really be alone. She just doesn’t want to be seen with me.” She made a dissatisfied hmpf noise, obviously directed at her absent teammate rather than me. “Anyway, uh…right, the folder. I’ll show you where we keep files and stuff once you get home, yeah?”
“Okay? Sounds good. Um. Get home safe?”
I had unconsciously referred to Lighthouse Tower as “home”, prompted by her doing the same—and was not at all prepared to unpack that right now. She smiled at it, at least. Unreasonably, distractingly pretty.
“Will do. Have fun with Hina. Remember, she ever makes you uncomfortable or pushes you too far and you need a bail-out—call me. I’m never too busy to wrangle her, promise. See you tonight!”
With that, she got in her car. We waved at each other as she pulled out and onto the road, and then she was gone, leaving me alone in the shadow of the split skyscraper. Well, not alone, according to her claim that Hina was around here somewhere—though she had been a bit vague about exactly how close. Nothing for it. I began to walk in the direction she had indicated.
—
Following the road as instructed led me through underpasses, past glass-enclosed plazas, and into a gradually more tourist-dense area. I didn’t look out of place on these streets; unassumingly dressed, black-haired white guys were among the most common types of tourist, and I was relieved to find that my prior stressing about being recognized was unfounded for now.
The road eventually terminated at a T-intersection, surrounded on all sides by what my maps app said were hotels—Hiltons, Hyatts, and the like. I stood at the corner of the intersection, now unsure of how to proceed. I supposed I should at least cross the road; there was an interesting-looking statue in one of those small green spaces Opal seemed to like so much. It was really just a small brick plaza with a row of trees and some shrubs, and the greenery wasn’t exactly living up to its name in the middle of winter, but the open space was at least a reprieve from the relative claustrophobia of the tall buildings around me. The crosswalk signal turned green, and I was about to cross—
A spark of icy fire ignited in my chest. The cold winter air was suddenly cloying around me, far too hot and humid by contrast to the frigid magic blooming inside me. I stumbled—not into the street, thankfully, more of a stagger to the side to lean against the traffic signal’s post. An attack? An ambush by the PCTF or Hikanome, taking advantage of Opal’s laxity, her assurance that nobody would try this so soon?
As I tried to regain myself past the coughing fit and fight down the explosion of sweaty discomfort, I pressed my forearm to my side, denying my tattoo and the spear it held. If I was under attack, I could summon it in an instant; better to wait for the right moment and not give away that it was an option. Somebody approached me from the side, then, and I felt the tattoo itch. I waited, waited—then turned, raised my scarred arm to shield myself from the stranger. It was on the verge of igniting, wisps of steam rising from it in the cold air.
Then logic caught up to me. This spark of flame? A stranger on the streets? It was Hina, duh. I sheepishly lowered my arm to indulge her ambush, the jitter in my chest from reignited panic transforming into a primal excitement at her predatory approach—which turned to a lump of leaden dread in my stomach when it wasn’t her.
Her eyes were wrong.
The rest of her look was explicable enough for a magic-enhanced disguise: black hair, black lipstick, a baggy black jacket like mine over a short skirt, big boots with some metal embellishments. Overall, goth, but fairly subdued, and all within the parameters of what was possible, still a twenty-something Japanese woman of approximately the right height and build. But her eyes weren’t blue. They were a mild brown, and that simply made no sense—no contact lens could refract away that impossible blue. Could magic? Yes, trivially—but my gut was sure, absolutely certain, that it wasn’t her, against the assurances of logic. I still attempted to trust the latter, trying to talk myself down from the spike of adrenaline and the almost painful itch in my arm.
“…Hina?”
The woman blinked in surprise and stepped back from me.
“You’re not supposed to be able to see me.”
She didn’t sound like Hina. Stronger Japanese accent, higher-pitched voice. I prepared to draw my spear.
“Who are you?”
She didn’t answer me, taking another step away, eyes narrowing. She didn’t move like Hina, none of the supernatural balance, neither a stalking prowl nor explosive motion. Then she splintered, like a hyper-realistic rendering in stained glass struck by a shockwave, and shattered into a thousand fragments. They burned away in wisps of smoke, and she was gone, leaving me to take deep, slow breaths of the chilly air and slowly release my mental hold on my spear binding as my core temperature returned to normal, human levels.
An illusion—a messenger? A voyeur, really, or perhaps a stalker, if I wasn’t supposed to have been able to see her. And how had I done that? My Flame’s reaction was surely a factor, but I hadn’t woven anything; whatever reaction that had been was pure intuition, like how Hina had directly stoked my flame last night. I shuddered at both the memory and the terror still in my veins, the adrenaline making my fingers shake as I fumbled for my phone to tell Opal what I had just seen, tell her to turn around and come pick me up—
“Hey, cutie. What happened? Ripple’s all fucky.”
The husky voice was unmistakable. So was the bouncy step that concealed the coiled energy of an apex predator on alert, one who knew that something had intruded upon her territory. She was in a comfortable-looking sweater and baggy pants, a silvery grey trenchcoat hanging over her shoulders. Fashionable as ever.
Those things didn’t confirm to me that it was her, though, not beyond doubt; I still nearly jumped out of my skin, half-brandishing my forearm with its renewed hiss of steam, the itch returning to my tattoo. I didn’t lower my guard until she lowered her dark sunglasses, peering at me over the rims.
I’d never been so relieved to see those sapphire eyes.
Author’s Note:
If you’re ever in Tokyo, I highly, highly recommend visiting one of the observation decks, either at Tochou, Roppongi Hills, Shibuya Sky, or especially Skytree. It’s incredible, especially if you don’t have hangups about altitude like Ez does; hopefully the prose conveys the sheer absurd scale. It really does just sort of fade into the horizon.
Thanks to the beta readers: Softies, Maria, Cassiopeia, and Zak.
Join the Discord to discuss the story and hang out with other Sunspot readers!
Join the Patreon to support the story and read chapters three weeks ahead of public!
The Main Todai building was officially called Lighthouse Tower. The actual name in Japanese was a direct transliteration of the English and had inspired my first impromptu Japanese lesson on the walk over, through an underground tunnel on the first-level basement linking it to the adjacent parking structure.
‘R’ was a terrible letter, at least the Japanese one. It just wasn’t a sound my mouth was used to making at all.
“You’re getting there! You can get away with a really light ‘D’ sound instead for the ‘R’. Make the last ‘A’ longer, too.”
“Daitohausu tawaa?”
“Too hard on the ‘D’.” She immediately facepalmed at her own innuendo. “I’m so glad Hina didn’t hear that.”
When her hand came away, she looked the same—no makeup? Her skin really was just that smooth. The realization prompted a jolt of envy I didn’t quite understand, and I brushed my face with my fingers unconsciously. I discovered a few more missed spots around my jaw that had gone unshaven. The spot Hina had zapped stung a bit, and I was grateful that it wasn’t visibly inflamed as I checked my reflection in the rearview mirror.
Opal’s car was in a reserved spot right next to the tunnel. It wasn’t visibly the main ride of a major VNT organization leader. It was a nice car, some low-rider sporty import in a sleek white that matched her hair and tail, but I had been primed for…actually, I wasn’t sure what I had been primed for. One of those anime girl illustration wraps, but of her team? That didn’t sound like her; she didn’t even have a bumper sticker in that vein. The interior was more custom than the exterior, though: the driver’s seat was modified to accommodate her tail, the lumbar section of the back removed to allow the thick limb to spill out into the backseat and coil like…toothpaste? Surely there was a more flattering comparison, but that was what came to mind.
Alice was dressed slightly heavier than yesterday, opting to also add a pale-yellow crop top over the sports bra underneath the same white jacket. That was presumably for propriety’s sake rather than anything to do with the cold, but even with the addition, I would have been horribly embarrassed to wear such an exposing ensemble to a government office. Being in proximity to it was an exercise in fighting down secondhand embarrassment even as I rebuked myself for the way my eyes were drawn to the subtle bounce of her chest. I had to build up my tolerance to this sort of thing soon. Surely, the way my eyes wandered of their own accord was making these girls uncomfortable, despite assurances to the contrary.
She was already snacking on some sort of pastry: circular with a hole in the middle, like a donut, but with square edges instead of round. She took a few massive chomps, chewed hastily, swallowed with some effort, took a long draw from an iced tea she’d managed to sneak out the door while fleeing Hina and Amane’s argument, and then changed the topic as we pulled out of the parking space.
“You’re taking the amputation rather well.”
Was I? I supposed I was.
“It’s—thank you?” Silence reigned for a few beats as we went up a ramp to the parking structure’s ground level. “It doesn’t seem like all that big a deal, I guess. I don’t know. Maybe it hasn’t sunk in?”
If the quality of the rush-job prosthetic they had already given me was anything to go by, the one still in the works would be basically perfect once I finished healing. I didn’t feel like an amputee, at any rate. Opal nodded, waving at somebody getting out of their car who was presumably starting their workday. Support staff, perhaps, a totally unremarkable 40-something man in a suit. Slicked back hair, briefcase—the very image of a Japanese salaryman, even to my limited cultural context. His car was much less flashy than Opal’s, some mini Mitsubishi that they probably only sold domestically. He responded to Opal’s gesture with a small bow as we passed by.
“That’s Suzuki-san, no relation to Hina. He’s on the marketing team. You’d like him, I think…anyway, amputation. It’ll feel more real with time. This might sound a bit uncouth, but you got pretty lucky. If you had lost more of the foot, like up to the ankle, your recovery timeline would look much worse. The fact that you can already stand even without the stabilizer is a boon. Don’t just grit your teeth through it if it hurts, though, yeah?”
I assumed that came from experience with Amethyst’s condition. Even in my limited experience thus far, it was clear that she was a mess. Actually, it occurred to me that I’d hardly seen her stand in her human form, let alone walk. She didn’t seem to carry a cane or any other sort of mobility aid, but my gut said she ought to. My memories went back to the glimpse I had caught yesterday of the port in her midriff, and the way her argument with Hina had been on the verge of a shouting match. Both of them had pointed at me at least twice even in that short period.
“…Honestly, I feel like I’m imposing. Did that argument start because of me?”
“Ah, no, no. You’re entirely blameless for that. It’s more like…well, you know Hina. And Amane is the opposite, avoidant. Always in mantle because it lets her not be in pain for a while.”
“Mm.” As always, mention of their brand of magic took my attention. It seemed alright to ask these things now. “So your transformations can’t feel pain? No red links anywhere?”
“Well, it depends. Pain is a useful signal, but…alright, actually, we should start at the beginning, since I was hoping to have this talk on the way over anyway. How much do you know about magical girls?”
“Not much.”
“…Meaning?”
“I…uh. I have a friend who’s a fan of yours, but that’s it. Never seen an anime about them or anything.”
We arrived at a little electronic toll booth that marked the entrance of the parking structure.
“That’s alright. We’ll get you up to speed on the classics in the next few weeks.” She rolled down the window and waved a card at it. “But let me fill you in on the basics now, if that’s alright?”
The booth beeped and raised the barrier arm to allow us onto the streets of Tokyo. I had seen the immediately local skyline from my room’s window up on the 20th floor, but the effect was different on the ground. Down here, it was easy to forget just how tall the buildings were; Lighthouse Tower’s 20-story glass-and-steel facade was the same as its 80-story neighbors. With it as the model in my head and my view of higher floors obstructed by the car’s roof, it felt like we were surrounded by mid-size buildings rather than the truly tremendous skyscrapers they were. My frame of reference was a bit skewed anyway, though, since the Spire completely dwarfed anything in this city.
Since I couldn’t much see the skyline from down here, what really caught my attention was the people. The weather forecast had said it was actually a fair bit warmer here than in England today, high of 9 Celsius—yet everybody was bundled up. Scarves and hats abounded, topping off long overcoats and other heavy winter wear, a stark contrast to Alice’s athleisure. Her exposed skin wasn’t entirely without company among the pedestrians, though. She gestured with her reduced pastry at a trio of girls in bona fide sailor uniforms, bare-legged under their skirts. The girls pointed back at us; the glass was tinted, so they probably couldn’t see us, but it stood to reason that Opal’s personal ride was pretty iconic in its own right.
“That’s how old we were when we started. Most mahou shoujo deals with girls in high school or younger, chosen by some higher power for their youthful purity—the untainted love in their heart, that sort of thing—to do battle against evil monsters.”
I nodded, already seeing some of the real-world parallels, though our kind—still wasn’t used to thinking of myself as the in-group—were far more randomly selected. No distinguishable pattern for us. “Flametouched.”
“Mhm.” She took another bite of the pastry I would later learn is called a baumkuchen. “Aesthetically speaking, I’m sure you’ve already seen enough Sailor Moon stuff to get the picture by osmosis, online as you’ve been. No offense.”
“None taken. So it’s all, er, ribbons, hearts, gems?”
“Frills. Bows.”
She hung a left, and we pulled onto what seemed to be a more significant traffic artery. The streets reminded me of NYC in terms of how things were separated into blocks rather than the jumble of many European cities, but the big difference was that the Japanese loved signage to a degree that I had never quite seen before. Street signs were fairly universal, of course, but every storefront had a big sign, and everywhere I looked, there were flyers and bulletins. Opal continued.
“And wands, and sometimes actual weapons, yes. And all that comes with the transformation; otherwise, they’re just regular girls. The five of us, not getting those as part of our signing bonus, so to speak, had to make our own transformations. The Japanese for that is henshin, by the way; that’s the word you’ll see people use when talking about our mantles.”
“Henshin.” I rolled the word around in my mouth. I’d probably seen Star use it before.“Got it. So technically speaking, a mantle is…a PMLMC? My friend says it’s more mech-like than an actual transformation, but that’s all speculation.”
She took another sip of iced tea. “Correct. Yes, your friend is right; they’re psychomotive. It’s a neat little fourspace swap that gets our actual body out of harm’s way, and we plug our consciousness into the LM construct to fight without worry of harm. You can see how that’s not really on the original theme.”
“But visually it’s just an outfit swap?”
“Visually, yeah, the basic LMC is a duplicate of our bodies, and we add modifications on top of that for the outfits, which at least gets us looking like proper mahou shoujo, other than Amane. But unlike the source material, it’s an entirely separate body, so we had to implement everything ourselves. You saw some of the structural and motive elements yesterday—the parts derived from Spire dermis—but the sensory and control stuff is where most of the work goes. Every sense is custom-implemented.”
“And the fewer the better, since those would be red links.”
“Yes!” She sounded pleased I was keeping up. “So the real trick is getting enough psychomotive integration that controlling it is as fluid and intuitive as our own bodies, without the red links relaying pain down the lattice back to us. It’s finicky, and not the first solution we went with—ask Ai to show you her back binding sometime.”
“I—I’m not sure I could manage that. It sounds fascinating, though.”
She chuckled, slitted pupils looking at me out of the corner of her eyes. “You really don’t have to be so nervous around us. If you’re making us uncomfortable, believe me, we’ll let you know. We wouldn’t have asked you to stay with us if we were worried about that sort of thing. Where was I—yeah, so we’re not really working on actual mahou shoujo rules, you understand?”
I wished I could be less nervous and briefly considered confiding more in her about it—but reflexively retreated from examining that notion, instead accepting the dangled bit of conversational escape. “I think so. So…you’d say the mecha comparison is accurate?”
I didn’t know much about that genre either, but Opal nodded.
“We’ve done a lot of work to try to make it more hooked-in and less like flying a jet fighter, but…yeah, I hate to admit it: we’re magical girl-shaped mecha, functionally speaking. Mind if I ask who your friend is? One of the YouTubers? That’s the sort of circles you move in, to my understanding.”
“Um, not quite. But she does a lot of the research for some of the videos about you—about Lighthouse as a whole, I mean. Um…Starstar97?” I cringed at how the username sounded in this offline setting, but Opal nodded in recognition.
“Heard the name, I think. Tell her I said hi. Actually—” We had just come to a stop at another fairly large intersection, so she turned to me and threw up a peace sign, flashing a practiced smile. Radiant indeed. “A pic would make her day, I hope? I could do a short video, too; this light usually takes about a minute.”
“Um, wow—really?” Should she even be doing something like this while we were on the road? Didn’t that sort of thing give a bad impression? But it wasn’t like I was going to question her judgment on this; she certainly would know better than I. I fumbled my phone out of my pocket; I had been trying to adhere to ‘polite conversation behaviors’ by not looking at it and instead keeping my eyes on the city around us. “Ready?”
“Yep.”
I hit record and tried to keep the camera steady. Radiance Opal launched into a peppy, authentic-sounding greeting.
“Hey, Starstar97! I’m with Ezzen, and he mentioned you’re a fan, so I just wanted to say thanks for your support and the work you do! Houseki hikare!” She nodded to me after a moment. “There you go. Hope she likes that! And send that to me, too, if you would? I won’t put the whole thing up publicly, but this year we’re going to do a montage video like ‘Every Time the Radiances Said Houseki Hikare in 2022’.”
That wasn’t particularly my speed—I always ignored similar videos of the Vaetna saying the Spire’s catchphrase when they showed up in my recommended page—but it was definitely the kind of thing Star enjoyed. And Opal was right, this was going to make her day, or maybe her whole week. I was pleased to find my cell connection acceptable to send the video even while on the road. I attached a small message of my own, too.
ezzen: Treat for you. Opal’s so nice; she’s not actually quite this peppy, but she’s so damn…kind.
ezzen: Which she’s currently explaining to me is very mahou shoujo, so I guess that tracks.
ezzen: Hope I’m spelling that right.
We pulled onto an elevated motorway.
“Um, can she share it around?”
“Yeah, of course, if she wants. We just have a policy of not sharing it on our end because, well…some of our fans can get jealous.” Her grip audibly tightened on the steering wheel, a squeal of leather. I relayed the permission, though not the comment.
The cityscape was changing around us. The high-rises had given way to shorter, squatter apartment buildings—though still only short by comparison, most of them being at least eight stories tall. Soon after, the buildings were entirely replaced by trees on both sides. Opal gestured to the left with the final chunk of baumkuchen.
“This green stretch is Motoakasaka, which has a bunch of temples and one of the old Imperial estates. Can’t get a very good view of it from up here, though.”
Sure enough, a column of apartment buildings soon obstructed what little view we had. Now that we were away from the pedestrians and storefronts, the cityscape was mostly defined by grey concrete juxtaposed with clusters of foliage denuded of most of their green by the winter. Come spring, when these little islands of nature were back to their full green, I could see how it’d be pretty. As it was, though, the city had a certain brutalist ugliness to it, at least from this vantage point.
“I don’t love that we’re not ‘proper’ mahou shoujo in our transformations, but there are upsides. We can’t lose our powers by losing our purity, for one. And real magic is a lot more flexible than the power systems you see in most anime.”
I didn’t want to offend her, but I needed clarification on the basis for this whole thing.
“Uh…so, it’s roleplay?”
“I mean…in the sense that we’re not literally selected by a higher power on the basis of purity, no.” She sighed. “But that’s not in our control, and we’re the real thing in every other sense. Are the Vaetna roleplaying superheroes?”
“They’re really more like knights,” I protested.
“Point. Why does it matter that our moral code comes from anime? I’m trying to make a difference with the hand I’ve been dealt, to follow in the footsteps of the heroes I grew up admiring. Am I wrong in saying you look up to the Vaetna in the same way?”
She wasn’t, but it felt like a false dichotomy. In my eyes, she was comparing a fictional morality system from kids’ cartoons to a group of people who engaged in very real geopolitics.
“The Vaetna are real, though.”
“What we believe in isn’t all that different from the Spire. We just—can’t trample over nations like they can. And wouldn’t even if we could. That doesn’t make it roleplay. Doesn’t make it fake.”
She was getting defensive. I flinched. “Alright, sorry. So…” I searched for another topic. “If the aesthetic matters so much, why’s Amethyst a big crystal mech? And, er, your tail, is that inspired by anything?”
“Amane likes the intimidation factor of being huge, and copying her body for the LM is…complicated, in a way that it isn’t for the rest of us. Residuals. As for this…” She swished her tail in the backseat. “Memorable, isn’t it?”
“Er, yeah, I suppose. Are dragons, ah, mahou shoujo?”
She scratched her temple as we changed lanes.
“Well…animal traits aren’t unheard of, but usually it’s part of the whole team’s theming, and I’m sure you’ve noticed that that’s not our theme. That’s because I didn’t choose it. It’s a metamorph residual, like Hina, though hers are more subtle. It started for me when we got our flame donation. I’ve come to appreciate how distinctive it is, though. Being Todai’s Dragon has a nice ring to it.”
There was something a little halting in how she said it.
“So it’s flesh, not LM.”
“Yep, marvel of nature and all that. It’s really quite marketable—we’ve got plushes of the tail, my eyes stand out as much as Hina’s or Amane’s in the posters…I’ve lucked into being a real-life anime girl, even if the exact subtype doesn’t entirely fit with my genre, and that’s worth it when we trade so much on—”
“Do you like it?”
“—our reputation and appearance.”
I don’t know why I blurted it out and interrupted her, but it was just something in her tone. It sounded like she was rationalizing. Her eyes flicked to me briefly before refocusing on the road.
“I live with it.”
That hurt, and I wasn’t quite sure why. She continued after a moment.
“It’s…inconvenient, for sure. You see how much I eat, and stuff like this seat—lots of accommodations like that. I miss wearing pants sometimes. I’m more of a skirts girl anyway, though.”
I abstained from pointing out that she wasn’t wearing a skirt now; I had intentionally avoided examining the exact way her leggings were modified to make room for the extra limb when we had been walking together. She was practically begging the question, but I was too shy to ask about her fashion choices…and there was another kind of discomfort, the way she signaled unhappiness about her body, that made my fingers return to my face, feeling the spots of stubble I had missed again.
“Sorry for interrupting.”
“It’s fine.” She seemed as eager as me to go to another topic. “Does the, er, commercialized side of what we do bother you?”
“Not…really? The Vaetna’ve got plenty of merch.” Then I thought about it some more, reminded of something Star had said before regarding how their PR worked. “Well…can I say something that might be offensive?”
“Sure. Trust me, I’ve gone under much more severe cross-examination of our way of doing things.”
“Alright, then…it just seems especially performative. Like with the video earlier.” I put my hands up hastily. “Not like roleplay! It’s just…if you’re playing up the act for publicity, then that’s sort of acknowledging that it’s at least partially an act, not totally genuine.”
“Not wrong. But we live it, and believe in it. It’s…there’s a lot of reasons we do it. It’s important to be seen. It’s kind of a concession to the original concept, since mahou shoujo do tend toward a sort of secret identity paradigm, but…well, think about it this way. Since our status as magical girls is not granted by some higher power, we need to work harder than Usagi or Hibiki to maintain it, to make it more real. So, yes, it’s performative, but only because we believe it matters. Is that a problem?”
“Er—as long as you’re not going to try to get me in one of those costumes.”
She laughed. “Perish the thought! Whatever Hina says, I know you didn’t sign up to become one of us. No pressure to participate with any of the marketing stuff beyond what concerns your research.”
That was something of a relief.
“How much does that factor into the, er, day-to-day? Promotions and all that?”
“Depends. In terms of what you’d call VNT activities, we’re more on the reactive side, so it depends on if there are monsters for us to fight at the time.”
“Um…’monsters’ as in infernos?”
“That’s another spot where theory sort of bows to praxis. Case in point—see these trees on our left? That’s Meiji Jingu, the biggest shrine in Japan. It’s attached to Yoyogi Park. Next week, Hikanome—er, Sun’s Blessing—is holding a demonstration here, and we’re supposed to keep an eye on them.”
“They’re a cult, right? Like Zero-Day.” I wasn’t quite sure where she was going with this.
“Yep. Biggest in Japan. In a way, their leaders are a pretty good adaptation of the ‘proper’ mahou shoujo villains. People with the same powers as us, but misusing them. Hardly an objective black-and-white structure, but in a world where so-called ‘incarnations of darkness’ and such don’t exist…” She punctuated the label with air-quotes. “And yes, infernos, but those aren’t evil. They’re just…”
“People. Like us.”
“Just the bad ending, yeah. That’s a little mahou shoujo, too.”
It was one of the great injustices of this era that some people couldn’t handle the awesome power that fell from the sky, overwhelmed by these fragments of what the various cults called the only provable divinity. It broke my heart that nobody had found a way to reverse the process or permanently contain them; they all met the same fate as Dad. Even the Vaetna still just went for mercy kills, seven years on. Opal went on somberly.
“It’s one of those things I dream about solving, a way to stop the inferno and save the victim. Nobody deserves that.” Her resolution hung in the air, an intense pressure directed at nothing in particular.
“Yeah. Me too.”
As I’d originally explained to her yesterday, part of what had gotten me into magic was the drive to understand what had happened to Dad. I’d eventually been forced to accept that it wasn’t the type of magical problem I’d be able to solve in glyphs, not if the Vaetna couldn’t with their mastery of magic and near-boundless power. But maybe…with Flame of my own, with the Radiances’ help? It was egotistical to think I could do what the Spire couldn’t, but the spark of hubris reignited in me. I resolved to take another look at my old papers on the topic tonight.
Her follow-up question was no reprieve from the dark atmosphere. “Do you think there’s such a thing as evil, Ezzen? As monsters?”
“I…well…The Spire Stands, you know?” I sheepishly tried to articulate how that connected. “The strong ought to—have an obligation to—protect the weak, but…power corrupts. Not always, but often enough. I don’t know much about Sun’s Blessing specifically, but Flamebearer cults and the like…they’re ugly. I think there’s evil there.”
“Agreed. Most of the believers are fine. Just people, again, and I can’t fault people for needing to believe in things. But the VNTs at the center of it? I’d call Sugawara emblematic of the monsters, at least as far as flamebearers are concerned.”
“He’s…the founder of Hikanome? ‘The Savior’?”
“Don’t call him that.”
I noted some hypocrisy there—her team got the larger-than-life, fiction-inspired titles, but didn’t extend the same privilege to their enemies. I didn’t interrupt her to call it out, though, because from what I knew—she was right. He deserved to be left in the dustbin of history after what he had done. She continued.
“The UK’s got a big cult too, right?”
I had figured from the accent that she had grown up in London, so I was a bit surprised she didn’t know. “Well, Zero-Day is technically based in America…but yeah, they’ve got some influence. Really, though, everything in the UK regarding magic is subordinate to the PCTF.”
“How big?”
“Er, I’d have to check.” A quick google gave the answer. “Eight hundred thousand?”
“Hikanome has seven million in Japan and three million more abroad. Next week they’ll fill the entire park.”
I went quiet, looking out the window as I watched the park pass us by. It had dominated the left side view for the past few minutes.
“And you’re supposed to stop that from turning into a riot?”
“They’re pretty peaceful these days, with Sugawara in prison, at least the sect that’ll be there next week. It’s more about appeasement, showing our faces. They love us, worship us. Off the record, the feeling isn’t entirely mutual.”
“The fans you mentioned before?”
“Yeah. But like I said—they’re not the problem, not the monsters. What do you think of the PCTF?”
It was a leading question, and I understood where it was headed.
“I…I mean, I had overall good experiences with them with this,” I gestured to the scars on my arm, “But it’s kind of an open secret that they’re less than ethical. And the rumors…” I didn’t know how to segue gracefully into what she wanted me to ask. It was a horrible thing to acknowledge, even when the same fate had nearly befallen me two days ago. Her confirmation made my tattoo itch as my skin crawled.
“All true. Every single one. She’s living proof. Every time she has to cancel an event because she’s bedridden, every time she tries to hide the fact that she can barely keep food down—it’s on their heads.” Her voice could have cut diamond. “This doesn’t leave this car or the penthouse, you understand?”
“I—yes, I understand. So…they really did…?”
This didn’t feel like a topic for the sunlight, for this cold February day on the way to do some terribly boring paperwork and go on a not-date in the city after. This pretty girl and her sports car ought not to exist in the same world as black sites and drugs and torture. But I knew in my gut that Opal was telling the truth.
“They did. Her and dozens more.” She took a deep breath. “I think you being here will bring us back into conflict with them, basically inevitably. Hina knew that would happen. She wants the fight—we have unfinished business. The reason I really wanted to get the ball rolling on your paperwork today was to give your presence here some legitimacy before the bloodhounds show up.”
“They won’t actually try to abduct me again, would they?” My blood was up just thinking of the possibility. Surely, the Spire would step in if it came to that; it would be a huge, front-page-news violation of the standing agreements between all the various VNT groups.
“They might. Listen—” I heard her tail moving in the backseat. “As far as I’m concerned, if there are monsters in this world, it’s them. At least the cults believe in something, and it’s hard to begrudge them that when we just discussed where my own beliefs come from. But the PCTF just wants power for its own sake. ‘Peacekeepers’. Ha. If they had their way, we’d all be turned into fucking batteries for their superweapons.” She laughed mirthlessly, looking straight out onto the road. I suddenly realized how hot the air in the car had gotten and squirmed a bit in my seat. “No. They are not touching you. I refuse. Not in our city.” Then she suppressed the incandescent fury, her voice softening, the atmosphere in the car cooling back down to tolerable levels.
“Revenge isn’t mahou shoujo. But destroying evil is.”
—
There had been a time in my life where I interacted with a government office on a nearly daily basis. My dad had died on the first day of the firestorms, and it had taken a few months for nations to get a grip on reparations for the casualties and the bereaved. Consequently, I was in the US government’s first batch of the Inferno Recovery Program, one of the predecessors of what would become the PCTF. The program included what little testing for residuals had been available at the time—before ‘ripple’ was even in the vocabulary for magic—as well as a three-week period of observation ‘just in case’.
I was a special case for two reasons: one, because I was directly related to the unfortunate flametouched—“Paranatural Event Origin,” as the endless documents had put it back then, already denuded of personhood—and two, because I wasn’t a US citizen, and they needed to figure out what to do with me. Ultimately, they’d shipped me right back to Bristol, where I spent two years with my grandparents, in and out of hospitals for regular checkups while both the UK and American governments figured out what more should be done with me, if anything.
Nothing really came of it; rather anticlimactic, in a way. I had no residuals, no evidence of being somehow secondhand flametouched or anything of that sort. If I had shown any signs, I would have likely been subjected to a further battery of testing and been more closely watched by the PCTF during my rise to prominence online. Instead, the last time I had met with an official on that basis was on the five-year anniversary, and that had been for a general check-in and well-wishes, nothing exciting. I had still clung to the idea that my dad’s death and the burns on my hand meant something, that it had marked me as special in the eyes of the Frozen Flame, but that had never really had much basis in reality—
Until two days ago. Now, the fact that my flames manifested from those scars was a surefire sign that I hadn’t gone entirely untouched by that first encounter. I didn’t buy into the idea that the Flame was necessarily a blessing, but the events of the past two days had made me certain I was special in some way, if only by circumstance rather than any actions of my own. Hina and Ai had reinforced that idea; even the least charitable interpretation of the former’s predations toward me implied that she saw something there, and the latter had outright said that I might not be playing by the same rules as other Flamebearers.
Tochou inflicted a critical strike upon these notions of ‘specialness’ by the simple weight of paperwork. I had sort of expected the de-facto leader of Todai paving the way would at least grease the wheels of bureaucracy—it was not to be. We were treated more or less exactly like every other person. We’d go to a kiosk, take a numbered ticket, wait a bit, then go to a clerk. Opal would talk with them for a moment, we’d get some documents, she’d talk me through what it said, I’d sign, and we’d be directed to a different kiosk, slowly accumulating extra paperwork and receipts for fees which she assured me weren’t coming out of my pocket. In all, we’d done this cycle four times so far.
I’d had a bit of a scare when I realized I hadn’t thought to bring my passport, but it turned out that Opal had retrieved it from my backpack yesterday. She’d taken my travel documents so I couldn’t escape—but that was nagging paranoia, easier to brush off than ever; it was just her being prepared. That worry still lingered regarding how I was essentially bound to her as long as she was holding onto my foot’s stabilizer, but given the state of my ankle, I wasn’t going anywhere fast anyway. In all, my foot had been wonderfully cooperative as we navigated to different areas of the bureaucratic labyrinth, at least compared to the near-uselessness from before the stabilizer had been introduced, even if my ankle still throbbed distantly. I continued to ice it while we were sat down, which was helping.
Opal handed the passport back to me as we returned to the small sitting area we had essentially claimed as a home base between interacting with clerks. She sat to my right, sideways on her chair to accommodate her tail, rifling through the documents we’d accumulated.
“What would have happened without it?”
“Well, you still have an actual ID, but they’d have had to check with the UK embassy, probably, and that would be a snag for the PCTF to get involved.”
“So as long as everything stays on Japan’s side, they can’t touch me?”
“Well…I didn’t say that. I had our legal people look into it when Hina brought you in, and while the UK doesn’t have grounds to extradite you as a fugitive or anything—they would if Japan was a NATO member, but they’re not—you should still probably stay far away from the embassy for the time being.”
“Until…?”
“I…don’t know, yet. This’ll blow over eventually.”
Some decisions were made; for one, my address of residence was to be Lighthouse Tower, same as the Radiances. In addition to continuing the pronunciation lesson from earlier, I also received my crash-course in the rest of the country’s addressing system: backward compared to the US or UK, starting at the largest scale and working down from prefecture to city to neighborhood to street address. We also had to contend with my name.
“Dalton is what’s on your ID. Is that alright?”
I had just been getting used to being called Ezzen. “It’s—fine. It’s what I’m used to, anyway.”
She seemed to pick up on the frustration of identity, putting a hand gently over mine, which I half-flinched away from before suppressing the urge. “We’ll still call you Ezzen if you’d like; Dalton doesn’t have to be your name anywhere but the paperwork. I just don’t want to get in trouble because the names on your documents mismatch. It’s a huge pain. Is there a reason you prefer the online name?”
“Um.” I really didn’t want to admit to her that it had been because Hina had pushed me, so I fell back on the explanation I had used with Ebi. “Well, you know the etymology, right?”
“{MANIFEST}. So it’s your…identity with magic, and it signals your preference for the Spire.” She saw how I shifted uncomfortably; she was right on the money. “It’s nothing to be embarrassed about, take it from me. Coming up with names was one of the first things we did when forming Todai.”
That made me feel better; the majority of Flamebearers with any kind of public presence took on some sort of epithet or title, and even simpler, less-aggrandizing name changes were also common enough. The Vaetna were actually the exception—or, since nobody could trace their identities from before the age of magic, they might have had the most complete identity overhauls of any of us.
“Um—how did you end up with ‘Radiances’ anyway?”
She grinned. “The gemstone thing was what I’d always imagined as a kid when I pictured myself as a magical girl, and Radiances were always the title. Just felt right, you know? I didn’t know which—for a long time, I sort of figured I’d be Diamond, but I wound up going with ‘Opal’ when my dreams actually came true. Still doesn’t feel real sometimes.”
Diamond would have fit her too, but I could see how it might come off as a bit arrogant compared to her teammates. I lowered my voice, feeling a little like this peek behind the curtain wasn’t supposed to be happening in public.
“So they’re…arbitrary? The choices of gemstones?”
She didn’t seem to share the concern, shrugging easily. This must have come up in interviews before for her to be so nonchalant about it.
“Mostly. For me and Hina, we already looked the parts, my hair, her eyes. Ai chose Emerald because…I think just because green is her favorite color, but I don’t quite remember. I’m at least sure that there’s no grand reason behind that one. Amane picked Amethyst because it sounds something like her name, even though I’ve always thought her eyes should have made her Jade or something else green—besides, Emerald was already taken by then. And Yuuka is…Bloodstone.” She chuckled. “Having a member with a more goth aesthetic is also pretty mahou shoujo, so I’m glad she fills that role so easily.”
I hadn’t yet met the fifth member, so I was only working off of Star’s rants and my abortive Wikipedia skim from yesterday to picture her, plus Ebi’s comment that she was some sort of life sciences grad student. Biology or ecology or something in that vein, but I didn’t quite see how that connected to a title like ‘Bloodstone’. It was a mystery for another time, though, because this whole topic had cut me a bit more deeply than I had been prepared for. I had always fantasized that, as a Vaetna, I’d go by Ezzen, not Dalton, and Opal’s own admission of the same habits created a weird feeling of intimacy I didn’t quite want to confront. I looked over the paperwork arrayed before us again, pointing at the first empty box I saw.
“What goes here?”
“Your furigana. That’s, uh…how your name is spelled in Japanese, since the sounds are different.”
She pulled out some random receipt she assured me we wouldn’t need, and wrote:
コリオー・エッゼン
“That’s your name in Japanese, I think. Korioo Ezzen. Uh, if we’re going with what’s on your ID, then…” She wrote another name: ダルトン. “Daruton. ‘Colliot’ is French, right?”
“Great-grandfather, yeah.”
“Well, sorry to say, Japanese is terrible with French words. Still, Ezzen can be your name basically everywhere but your ID, and if you ask people to call you ‘Ezzen’, they will. ‘Ezzen-san’ sounds…mostly Japanese, I think, not that you have to pass for a native anyway.” She scribbled some kanji. “You can get away with writing it in kanji a few different ways—but I’m getting off track. You can just stick with katakana. Like how I write Arisu for my name.” She scribbled it: アリス.
“Not a Japanese name, is it?”
“Well, I think the accent gives me away no matter what.”
“I, um, didn’t want to ask. You’re a Londoner?”
“Nope, grew up here.” She waved it off good-naturedly. “I’m what they call a halfie. Dad’s Japanese, Mom is a second-generation Brit. And Tokyo has a British school. It’s a whole thing, there are American ones too. So I’m a Japanese citizen, but lived in this little pocket of fake-London in the middle of Tokyo until high school. Spent a lot of summers out in the countryside with Dad’s family, though, so I do consider myself Japanese in terms of culture or heritage or however you’d call it.”
Wow. That was a step beyond the years I spent living in America. “You’ve never been to Britain?”
“I have, but never lived there. The plan was for me to go to Oxford—but that was before the firestorms, and once we were flametouched…no way. I wasn’t going to leave Hina and Ai behind.” She shook herself. “You lived in the US for a while, though, right? What was that like?”
“Fine? Normal? I don’t remember much from before it, and after…”
Little more needed to be said on that front. The arrival of magic had rather thoroughly screwed up practically everybody’s plans for the future in the short term, even disregarding the grander geopolitical impact. Doubly so if you were like me and had lost people, or were flametouched like the Radiances. I thought of what else to say. The memories seemed a little less painful knowing that her life had been just as derailed as mine in those first few weeks, so I searched for something to share.
“Well, there are things I miss about it. My dad was a chef, a really big one, so he’d take me to NYC and we’d eat at the fanciest restaurants for free since he was friends with everybody who ran those places. That was nice.”
Opal lit up at that, although she was still actively rifling through papers and filling in boxes the whole time, conscious of the timetable we were on. “That sounds—great. Tokyo is so good for food tourism, you have no idea. And they put out the red carpet for us—although between you and me, I prefer the chains and really grubby dives over the fine dining. You ever had Japanese pasta?”
“No.” I mean, of course not.
“Right, right. We’re doing Saizeriya next time I take you out, then. I’d ask Hina to take you today, but I’m sure she’s got her own ideas for a good time on the town.” She looked up from the document she was working on. “Not too late to back out of that if you’re getting cold feet, by the by.”
“…Cold foot. Just the one.”
My delivery was so deadpan it sounded almost glum, and her brow furrowed with concern—before she saw my lips twisted in a suppressed giggle. The stupid joke made her laugh quietly, covering her mouth, which made me unable to hold my own dumb guffaw. More importantly, this distracted us from the offered escape from today’s plans, without delving into my complicated and conflicting feelings about Hina.
“It’s great that you can joke about it already, really. How’s it feeling?”
“Ankle still hurts a bit, but the ice definitely helped. Stabilizer’s working a treat, it’s…so good to be able to walk properly again.” I hadn’t actually expressed that feeling out loud yet, and it felt nice to confide. Then I pointed at an object that had caught my attention earlier, a little stamp she was putting down at the bottom of the document. “What’s that?”
“Hanko. Personal seal, substitutes for a signature. Perks of having family history here.” She held up the document. “I know you can’t read it, but that says Takehara.”
I nodded. My earlier prediction that today would greatly exceed my capacity for cultural osmosis was proving true—case in point, just then the number for our ticket was called, and we stood to approach the next desk. As with the last four, the person attending us seemed a bit star-struck by Opal. She did most of the talking; by now, I was picking up that there was a lot of the same boilerplate dialogue every time, things that I could reasonably guess were long-winded “thank you”s and “would it be possible to…” phrases. I wondered how much of the language I’d pick up in a month’s time.
Opal seemed pleased with the progress we were making as we came away from the desk and returned to our impromptu home base. Mercifully, they generally didn’t seem too willing to enter our bubble of privacy; Opal’s star power seemed to keep them at bay rather than invite them to try to get a selfie or make small talk with the celebrity. It wasn’t that she was intimidating, at least not to me, more that she was a visibly important person in the middle of doing visibly important things, and I appreciated that people were giving us space. She noticed me not-so-subtly looking around us.
“Enjoy it while it lasts. People will be way more willing to come up and bother us when we’re on the street, tourists especially.” She indicated her tail and the way she sat sideways in her chair to accommodate it. “Fair warning, I don’t exactly try to hide.”
“Right, visibility. I got the impression Hina does? She said we’d be undercover.”
“Hina…is weird. She doesn’t believe in visibility off the clock.”
“But aren’t secret identities…magical girl?”
I felt sort of embarrassed to use the Japanese phrase in public as a foreigner, both on principle—it felt a little appropriative—and because I wasn’t particularly confident in my pronunciation. When Opal said it, mahou shoujo was beautiful, and I could practically feel the belief and determination behind it. Coming out of my mouth, it felt I was doing a disservice to both the language and the concept. But on the other hand, using the English phrase was nearly as awkward, grammatically incoherent.
“They are, but again, it’s one of those practicalities. Being seen is important, even when it’s—” she gestured around. “Just standing in line to get immigration paperwork done. We’re just people, you know?” She dropped her voice much lower and leaned in—this part wasn’t for listeners-in. “Hikanome thinks we’re above humanity, above the law. Even Hina thinks that way, to an extent. But it’s important to stay grounded. The Flame doesn’t make you any more…more, do you follow?”
That was the first thing she said that really sat wrong with me. I leaned away from her. I agreed with the basic premise—great power, great responsibility—but this was a common talking point from people who meant to suggest that the Vaetna subscribed to the same philosophy of transhuman superiority. But the Vaetna didn’t use their power to lord over the denizens of the Spire—indeed, their whole raison d’etre was to remind the powerful that they could and would be held accountable. The Spire’s ten knights were far more than regular humans, more than even VNTs, and that wasn’t inherently a bad thing. This was a familiar line of debate from the forums, and a familiar rebuttal was on my lips—something like “I think you can acknowledge and take advantage of a disparity of power without putting yourself on a pedestal”—but some danger-sensing part of my mind prodded me to consider why she had lowered her voice, why she didn’t want passersby to overhear this part in particular, even with the mild security of this conversation taking place in English. It wasn’t about the Vaetna; that was my own biases. I matched her whispered tone, thinking back to what she had said in the car.
“Sun’s Blessing wouldn’t be happy to hear you say that, I take it?”
She shook her head. “Not at all.” Then she looked around warily for anybody approaching. Satisfied the coast was clear, she reached into a not-space and retrieved something small, hurriedly popping it into her mouth and chewing. And chewing. I didn’t quite look at her—eye contact wasn’t exactly a strong point for me—but I could still see her face growing redder in my peripheral vision. I had to ask.
“…Nuts?”
“I get peckish!”
“I’m not judging.”
She chewed some more. “…Want one?”
“What kind?”
“Um—cashews, almonds, walnuts, peanuts. Salted.”
“Cashew, please. Why are we still whispering?”
“Um. We’re not really supposed to eat here.” She offered me a nut, dropping it surreptitiously into my cupped hand. Her tone returned to the politely-quiet, conversational level from before. “Anyway. I think you’re seeing what I’m getting at? We have to lead by example, show that anybody can do good.”
Because they didn’t even have the clout to say in public they weren’t naturally superior to the people around them. I maintained the whisper, now unsure of what could be safely said in public.
“Does Sun’s Blessing have that kind of power?”
Opal looked around again, judging the safety of this conversation, before opting to pull out her phone along with another nut.
Alice Takehara: The short explanation is that the National Public Safety Commission, who more or less hold our leash, are heavily tied to Hikanome. We keep Hikanome happy, they don’t pressure the Commission to restrict or sanction us.
Alice Takehara: The appeasement isn’t just about maintaining our fanbase. It’s politics.
I was oddly pleased that she shared my habit of proper grammar over text, even on our phones.
Dalton Colliot: Which is why Hina is policing a protest?
I frowned after sending the message, and went into my phone’s settings, changing my display name.
Ezzen Colliot: There we go.
Alice Takehara: ദ്ദി(˵ •̀ ᴗ – ˵ ) ✧
“How did you do that?”
“I have a whole menu of them. You’ve never seen kaomoji before?”
I had, but I had figured they fell more in the vein of ASCII art than an easily accessible menu.
“Show me how to get those?”
“Sure, later.”
Alice Takehara: But yeah, that sort of thing is the price we pay for having mostly free reign to do our thing.
Alice Takehara: It’s this or be essentially forced to participate in the whole South China Sea…thing. Dick-measuring contest, if you’ll excuse my language.
Alice Takehara: Mahou shoujo do not fight wars.
Ezzen Colliot: lol
Ezzen Colliot: (at dick-measuring contest, not the thing about war)
She acknowledged the clarification with a nod.
Ezzen Colliot: Seems adverse.
Alice Takehara: Try ‘corrupt’.
She knew the score. It was easy to see how situations like these could be construed as Todai being pressured into appearing to support Sun’s Blessing. This was already a tangle of politics that I had little patience for. Hina’s first lesson loomed as a kind of omen, now, and I was starting to understand why she had felt the need to impress it on me almost as soon as I had confirmed I was sticking around. Todai lived and died on leverage. I had always admired the way the Spire was able to cut the Gordian knot when it came to this sort of thing—but then, they had both the means and ideological sanction to go to war over it. Opal and her team had neither.
Ezzen Colliot: Also, ‘free rein’.
“What? No, it’s ‘reign’, with a ‘G’, like being in control.”
“Nope, look it up.”
“…Oh, darn.”
Alice Takehara: But there’s a weird upside to it all.
Alice Takehara: If we do wind up in open conflict with the PCTF, we can go public about what happened to Amane and all the other flamebearers like her.
Alice Takehara: And my hope is that Hikanome would lose their shit.
And there it was. Todai’s greatest leverage, a play of brutal realpolitik that took full advantage of their position in the public eye and could turn one of their biggest external pressures into a staunch ally against their most hated enemy. Not something to be done lightly; if they couldn’t make the accusation stick, it was easy to see how that could demolish Todai’s reputation, and even in the best case scenario, it was so adversarial as to almost be a declaration of war. And what of Amane’s own place in this, as the centerpiece, someone of whom Opal was clearly so protective? All that to say—
From what I now understood of the concept, such a move would not be mahou shoujo in the slightest.
Author’s Note:
Now we’re really crunching into some of the politics. Magical girls are serious business!
Thanks to the beta readers: Softies, Cassiopeia, Zak, and Maria.
If you want to gush about Ezzen’s eggness, make predictions, or dissect all the flaws in the worldbuilding directly to my face, I invite you to do so in the Discord!
Join the Discord to discuss the story and hang out with other Sunspot readers!
Join the Patreon to support the story and read chapters three weeks ahead of public!
The shower had a fold-out seat that allowed me to reach the burn on my foot without a perilous balancing act or sitting directly on the floor. Hot water cascaded off my back as I bent over, scrubbing gingerly around my burn. It was ugly: bloody reds and pinks dominated where new flesh was in the process of replacing old, while the edge was still covered in off-white blisters with hints of brown and purple, a decidedly medical palette. I was grateful I couldn’t feel it thanks to the patch, both in general and when I ran it directly under the shower head to scour off any bits of dead flesh that seemed ready to part ways after being softened by the stream.
The seat was a little incongruous with the accommodations I was still lacking, like how they didn’t even have spare clothes for me, but Ebi had explained that all the bathrooms had one, a holdover from the building’s past as a hospital. There were also several bars along the walls, which I had found indispensable in making it to the seat. My old bathroom wouldn’t have been big enough for them to be necessary, but here it was easily four steps to cross from the entrance of the unit bath—what Ebi had called the inner bathing chamber, containing equal halves shower and bath—to the controls for the water. Outside was the basin, suspiciously high-tech toilet, and towels in a pure white that was again reminiscent of a hotel, like the rest of my apartment.
Fiddling with the knobs for the shower had taken a few tries to get hot water coming out of the shower head. First it was cold water in the bath, then hot water in the bath, then a knob that seemingly did nothing, and then finally hot water from the shower. I’d then had to flick through the shower’s pressure settings to find one that was gentle enough for my injury; there were at least eight. At last, I’d been able to luxuriate for several minutes as I got the sweat and general ick off of my body. Normally, I’d rush through the process to save water, but that wasn’t a concern at all here, and I wasn’t in that much of a hurry to get dry and dressed. I was still processing what had just happened.
Opal’s display hadn’t turned into a fight—my stunned silence had given way to Hina clapping happily.
“She’s so cool, right?”
“Apologies. Just need to remind Hina that she’s not the only superhuman in the room.”
Hina rubbed her head into Opal’s hand even as it separated her from me.
“Aw, you know I know! You’re hotter than me, even.”
The dragon retreated from the affection, retracting her hand.
“Well, point made, I think. Ezzen, want some fruit?”
Both of the women seemed not to give the sudden burst of violence any more thought. From my decidedly mortal perspective, Opal had nearly given me a heart attack. My spear had found its way into my hand on pure instinct, but it was far too unwieldy with my legs folded under the table—only one of which was really functional anyway—and I had hastily unsummoned it as soon as it had emerged, blushing. Damn that reflex. I was not at all a fan of how the spear was becoming a fear-boner signaling those emotions. Even with a fully functional foot, my gut said it’d be useless against these two. Hina’s third lesson—“don’t escalate to violence when outgunned”—was ringing uncomfortably insightful. She’d be easier to brush off if she were wrong.
I sighed, feeling the water cascade down from my neck and shoulders, nice and hot. This apartment was far better insulated from the winter chill than my old one had been, so there wasn’t a real need to warm up my extremities, but it was still a pleasant objection against the tyranny of the seasons. I lathered shampoo into my mop of brown hair, some floral product borrowed from one of the girls’ stashes. The body wash and face wash were of similar quality; the three were a substantial upgrade from the all-in-one stuff I had been using before, with its cheap lemon scent and rather remarkable inability to properly clean my shaggy, thick hair. Well, it had gotten it clean well enough, but the texture was a far cry from the visible softness and glossiness of Hina’s. She and Opal had both noticed the somewhat dry and stringy texture while cleaning up from breakfast.
“Your hair’s a mess, cutie. Do you use any product?”
“Um—I mean, I wash it.”
“I can see that. No conditioner?”
“No?”
“Blah.”
She hurt my eyes by reaching into another non-space and feeling around for a moment, blue irises looking up and brow furrowed like she was trying to recall something. After a moment, she retracted a small bottle, still embalmed in shrink wrap.
“Behold! One of my spares.”
She handed it to me, her hand brushing mine ever-so-briefly. I knew that was intentional because of the wink. Opal called out from where she was loading dishes into the dishwasher; another luxury I hadn’t had until now.
“How’s he gonna carry that on his crutches? And get it out of the shrink wrap for him, at least.”
“Oh, yeah.”
Hina took the bottle back from me. Instead of puncturing the wrapper open with a fingernail or one of a hundred ways with magic, she brought it up to her mouth, found a place at its neck where the plastic spanned taut over a hollow space, and bit through it, tearing the wrapper off with her mouth. She never broke eye contact with me as she peeled it away from the bottle with her fangs and lips. Opal audibly sighed—impressive, given the distance and the water now running from the faucet as she rinsed something.
“Ezzen, give her explicit permission to put it in your room. This is a good exercise.”
I was put on the spot, more enraptured by the ministrations of Hina’s mouth than I’d like to admit.
“Please put that in—in my room.”
“Sure thing.”
Opal called after her as she hopped to her feet.
“Throw in some of your shampoo too!”
Hina jogged toward the stairs with a thumbs-up. She could probably have just teleported herself or the conditioner, but the vigor with which she ascended suggested a certain enjoyment of the physical activity. The puppy needed her walkies.
Opal came back toward me, leaning against the kitchen island.
“Okay, while she’s gone—speak freely. I meant what I said. You’re comfortable around her? If not…”
I didn’t know if “comfortable” was accurate, per Opal’s specific threat, but I didn’t feel inherently endangered by her. Or maybe…I did, and I liked that? I was no closer to detangling the disturbing prospect than I had been when I had gone to sleep last night, but maybe spending more time with her would clarify things.
“I don’t know. But I think I can manage, today.”
“Sorry.” She shrugged. “She can be a lot. You’re alright with spending time with her today, then?”
“Yes.” I thought for a moment. It wasn’t like me to ask these things, but—“Are you?”
“I’m…no, I’m not sure I am. If you don’t mind me saying so: right now, you’re delicate. I certainly wasn’t alright for weeks after being flametouched, and I had my family and Hina and Ai for support while we figured out…everything. I feel obligated to extend that same level of support to you. And so does Hina, she’s just…”
“Hina.”
“Quite. Well, if you’re committed.” A wry smile crossed her face. “I get it. She’s pretty.”
I reddened. Hina smothered my retort with her return, vaulting clean over the balcony and landing with only the lightest tap on the hardwood. Opal smoothly changed the topic.
“Gosh, your hair really is a mess. You’ve got no idea how to take care of it, huh?”
“Er…not really. I do wash it every day.”
That was a lie—particularly bad self-care weeks could have me going days on end without bathing. Hina called me on it.
“No, you don’t. Twice a week at most, I think.” She saw me shrink a bit, caught in the fib, “—which is good! That’s actually how much you should be doing it, you’re just not using the right product for hair as thick as yours.”
I sat there, avoiding their eyes, face burning. Hina trotted over to me and knelt at my side.
“Hey, there’s nothing wrong with learning how to take better care of yourself. You were a hikikomori before, right?”
“Hina.”
“What? It’s true. Hardly ever went out except for groceries.”
I knew that word. It was humiliating to admit, but the lack of judgment in those blue eyes was compelling.
“That obvious?”
“It’s fine. Y’know, Alice used to be the same? Went straight home after school, no social life, couldn’t stand up for herself—”
“Hina!”
Opal had barked that loudly enough to stop her teammate short. The hyena twisted, and the two looked at each other for a moment, communicating something I couldn’t understand. Hina turned back to me.
“Anyway. What I’m getting at is that you’ll feel better about yourself once you start taking care of this.” She ran her fingers through my hair, twirling a clump between her fingers. Then she leaned in all the way, burying her nose in it, and sniffed, earning a disapproving noise from Opal. She didn’t move, half-leaning onto me. I was distinctly aware of her breast against my shoulder.
Opal’s voice was droll. “Get off him so he can go clean up.”
“Aw, fine.” She detached herself from me and wandered back over to the kitchen. “You heard her, cutie.”
Which brought me here, sitting with a soaped-up cranium while the conditioner bottle loomed ominously on one of the shelves next to me. They had been a little oddly insistent about it, now that I thought about it. My gut said to resist…because they were telling me to take better care of myself? That didn’t map. I wasn’t such a shitty teenager as to wallow in my filth out of spite—just laziness and lack of clear incentive. Plus, I hadn’t been a teenager for almost a year. The point was, if I was going to be living with this gaggle of feminine celebrities, the least I could do was maintain basic hygiene—but no further. I refused to let Hina force me into new styles and flashy haircuts in pursuit of a makeover, and from there it would be a slippery slope into hour-long morning routines and closets full of clothes that needed dry-cleaning rather than machine washing. I didn’t want to spend that much effort on how I looked.
I stretched my legs, digging my heels against the white tiling. Breakfast sat heavy in my belly as I arched my back until my head bumped the shower wall. I sat there, shrouded in the steam, savoring the gentle spray of water from on high onto my stomach and legs. With my foot silenced, the one thing intruding on my relaxation was the marks Hina had left on my shoulder. It was a mild, inoffensive pain, only notable by contrast to the animal comforts in which I had immersed myself. I felt a dribble of shampoo work its way down my temple toward the outer corner of my eye and leaned forward to douse my head, scrubbing vigorously and shaking like a wet dog until the stream onto my lap ran clear.
Body, hair, face—with all parts of me clean and rinsed, I leaned back against the wall once more. The hiss of the water’s spray was a soothing blanket of white noise for my thoughts, the secure isolation of the room a chance to really decompress. I felt at the scars on the back of my right hand, remembering the months of physical therapy and the perpetual glances swiftly averted. Hina’s hand had healed to flawless, supple skin in minutes. If I changed as much as her—however that worked, something I hoped to discuss but was unsure I’d be able to bring up—would these scars disappear? Would my right side finally mirror my left again?
It was sort of moot either way, since I now had the tattoo marking my left arm. In that sense, there was already sort of a symmetry, marked on both arms by the flame; I supposed it had been stronger for the brief period I had a burn scar there instead of the tattoo. The now-erased scar had represented a mistake, a self-inflicted way of proving to myself that I’d be able to brave the dangers of being a flamebearer. At some subconscious level, I had already understood the role of pain. I’d cauterized the box cutter’s bloody wake with magic, filled my flesh with my weapon of choice.
The deed had forced me to act faster than otherwise—perhaps without taking time for the spear and producing that ripple, I could have made it to the Gate, and none of it would have turned out like this. I’d have gone to the Spire and become…and that’s where my thoughts always got caught. Surely, as a magic hobbyist of some renown and now also a flamebearer, there must be somewhere in the Spire for me. Perhaps I would be offered living conditions better than my old apartment—but that was true here as well.
So really, the biggest difference would be that I wouldn’t have Hina breathing down my neck. I insisted on thinking of that as an upgrade, denial made temporarily possible by the warmth of the water and steam supplanting that of her body and her Flame. More than anything, that aspect of all of this remained feeling unreal. Being whisked to the other side of the planet by a VNT group wasn’t quite unprecedented, but being courted…seduced? Hunted by one of them? It just wasn’t the kind of thing that happened to real people. She wasn’t actually attracted to me, just my flame. Hell, that might even have been why she agreed that it wasn’t a date. What was it, then? In no world could I call us friends, and it wasn’t technically like she was a coworker, not yet—what of the souvenirs she had left on my shoulder, stinging under the water? How did they fit in?
I was overthinking. I was getting too caught up in the labels. She was neither puppy nor hyena, and this was neither date nor not-date. I knew my feelings would blur once I killed the water and stepped out, that the distant throb of the bite marks would continue catalyzing the fear-laced desire, that the moment I stepped out of the bathroom I would once more be subject to political and magical forces far beyond my ken, that winter’s chill would again creep into my burned fingers. Hina had insinuated as much, earlier, when she had mentioned that the PCTF would be pushing their claim on me. When push came to shove, if I had to choosebetween only them or Todai—at that moment, I thought I’d choose Todai.
These apprehensions didn’t quite matter yet, though. I had paperwork first. I stretched again, bringing one knee up to my chest while extending the opposite leg, twisting my torso for a warm sensation of released tension along my back. I did it again on the other side, and while nothing made an audible pop, the musculature had definitely loosened, especially at the base of my spine and in my obliques. Along with the rest of the posterior chain, they were important for stability to put any real power behind a weapon as large as a spear. Besides, taking care of your back was important when you spent twelve hours a day sitting in front of a computer. I relaxed under the stream once more.
“Thank fuck for free hot water.”
It then occurred to me that it probably wasn’t actually free, not on the macro scale, since it presumably came out of Opal’s pocket.
“Thanks, Opal. Alice? Bluh. The dragon.”
My gratitude corrected, I turned off the shower head to save her money, listening to the hiss reduce to the rattling of a bucket of beads, then a drip, drip, drip. The unit bath was effectively sealed, so the steam lingered, a stark difference from the sudden influx of cold air to which I was accustomed. My hand found the nearest railing, and I hoisted myself up off the seat and onto my good foot, sort of shimmying my way over to the door. I opened the door and was greeted by the belated cooler air of the outside world as it mingled with the steam. I groped for the folded towel I had placed next to the basin outside, found it, yanked it in, and spent the next few minutes awkwardly figuring out how to dry myself satisfactorily with one hand stuck on support duty.
It was only after I had gotten my hair from ‘soaked’ to merely ‘damp’ that I remembered the conditioner. I winced, reddened—despite nobody being around to witness the mistake—and hobbled back over to the dripping shower head and the bottles arrayed across a few shelves, towel sort of slung over my back and shoulders like a fluffy cotton mane. The bottle was an unassuming dark pink—mauve, perhaps—and dewed by the steam, clearly part of a set with the shampoo. Where it diverged, though, was that instead of the head being a nozzle for some kind of cream or gel, it was for a spray. Reading the label, I reflected that I was lucky in two ways: one, the instructions were in English, and two, it was actually intended for damp hair, not for use right out of the shower. I thanked Hina for the former and dumb luck for the latter, then sprayed some of it experimentally into my hand and took a sniff.
Wow. Wow, that smelled good. I didn’t even have the floral vocabulary to describe the scent, only that it was woody, sort of spicy in a fruity way, and…was it racist to call it “exotic”? That was how the little blurb on the bottle described it, anyway. The aroma was primarily jasmine sambac, it said—I could get used to that smell for sure. I spritzed it onto the damp, dark, overgrown mop that was my hair, what seemed like a reasonable amount, then ran my fingers through it for lack of a comb or brush. As both my hands were occupied with my steadily-getting-less-tangled tresses, I leaned onto the shower wall. With that dubious support, and the tiles wet as they were under my single foot, in hindsight it was practically an inevitability that I’d—
“Shit!”
As falls went, it wasn’t nearly as bad as yesterday, when Ai had pulled me out of the medical bed as we wrestled for my spear. There, I had gone down pretty much head-first. Here, I half-caught myself, one conditioner-slicked hand attempting to grab the bar on the wall and missing. I brought my right foot directly under me on instinct just in time for it to cushion my fall, squished between my butt and the tiled floor. Because of the numbing patch, I actually didn’t realize how much my bad foot had taken my weight. It was only as I extracted the leg out from under me that it occurred to me that I might have twisted the ankle, or broken something, or aggravated the water-softened and still-healing burn scar—on visual inspection, at least that last one didn’t seem likely. Regardless of the extent of the harm, the patch muted it, so I was mostly left with soreness in my butt and pride for what was maybe twenty seconds of silence, filled only by the final drip-drip-drip of the shower head, until I heard a knock at the outer bathroom door.
“Are you alright in there? Heard something.”
Mercifully, it was Opal, not Hina…or Ebi. It was a little concerning that my doctor—indeed my only medical staff, it seemed—inspired relief at her absence. Her bedside manner truly sucked.
“Er—yeah, just slipped.”
“Oh no.” For some reason, she took that as permission to enter the outer washroom, and I saw her blurry silhouette through the frosted glass of the bath chamber’s door. “You’re not hurt, are you?”
“I’m—fine, I think.”
I really didn’t want her to come in and see me in this especially vulnerable state. Even though the intimidation earlier hadn’t been directed at me, I had been caught in the crossfire, and the spikes of adrenaline both then and now were reminiscent of the previous night in a way that made me frustrated at my libido. I didn’t want to feel that way about Opal. Nor Hina, but that ship had already sailed, and I was determined to keep the others at port, if at all possible. Coming face to face with the pretty dragon-girl while I was nude would not help with that at all.
“Are you sure? Do you want Ebi to take a look?”
“No, really, it’s alright. I landed fine.”
I was embarrassed to mention how my bad foot had actually taken the brunt of the landing, but it seemed fine—not that I could tell if something was wrong internally, totally numb as it was. Maybe that was why Ebi had been weirdly resistant and unhelpful with me using the patch—but she could have just said so.
“Alright. I could get your crutches?”
“I—Alice, I’m fine.”
“Sorry, sorry, I’m just used to Amane being a bit…bullheaded when she gets hurt. Are you sure you don’t want Ebi to take a look?”
“Er—no, I don’t think so.”
“Okay. Sorry for intruding. Um—anything else you need?”
“No.” Just for her to leave me alone.
She retreated, spouting apologies for bursting in and echoing Amethyst-derived concerns about me being a fall risk. Did she not see the hypocrisy? She had made a whole deal out of Hina needing permission to enter my room, but she could enter and leave at will on a hunch that I might need help? I wasn’t made of glass—okay, Ez, stop that, my rational mind replied. I was just aggravated from the embarrassment of the tumble. If I had been hurt—and I could have been—
I took stock. Foot seemed undamaged as far as I could tell, arse ached a bit and had been re-wetted from contact with the shower floor, and my damn spear was in my hand. It had bravely sallied forth to defend me when my hand had missed the support bar. I glared at it.
“How were you planning to help me with that, huh?”
It said nothing.
—
A few minutes later, I had put away my spear, gone from damp to mostly-dry, brushed my teeth, applied cream to my scar, and was now debating whether I actually needed to change from my comfortable dark-blue jeans into the shorts Opal had brought last night. I’d only changed into the shirt because my old one was ruined, but stayed in my jeans through the night. Actually, it was sort of weird that I had been wearing them when I had woken up in that room on the 18th floor. Shouldn’t they have at least cut the trouser leg off while inspecting for other injuries? I was glad they hadn’t undressed me, though. I didn’t need more compromising situations, given what had just happened minutes ago and last night.
According to the forecast, it was brisk enough outside that shorts would be unseasonable, and the trousers weren’t dirty, really…discounting a bloodstain on the right ankle it had picked up sometime during those brief, agonizing moments underground. Bloodstained clothing in a major government building seemed like a bad look, even accounting for my circumstances. Didn’t they have any bleach around here? Where did they even wash their clothes? Not that there would be time to fully wash the trousers anyway.
Wait, I was being an idiot. This was a problem magic could trivially solve; indeed, a similar problem had been presented to me yesterday, and the solution was still fresh in my mind. My hands itched for one of my notebooks to draw the glyph—but they now lived on the bookshelf on the far wall, and I didn’t feel like stumbling across the room. Instead, I scooched to the end of the bed and summoned my spear.
“Time for you to start earning your keep.”
The spear was longer than I was tall, so if I stretched, I could reach across the room and sort of drag a notebook from its shelf with the butt. It fell onto the floor with a thump. I reeled it in with an almost paddling motion as I coaxed the spiral-bound tome across the hardwood until it was close enough for me to lean down and retrieve it. I nodded to my spear before banishing it.
“Thank you for your service.”
I made a mental note to stop talking to inanimate objects before one of the Radiances caught me doing it as I flicked through the notebook. This was one of my newer ones, only about half-full, sheathed in a black plastic cover with a sturdy cardstock backing. I preferred pencil and paper for my notes; so much of glyphcraft was visual, and this afforded me far more freedom of drawing and formatting than attempting to do the same thing on the computer. I had once bought a cheap drawing tablet, but I had hated how it felt. Besides, there was a certain security in knowing that these notebooks couldn’t just vanish in a catastrophic failure of my computer’s hard drive, since I didn’t keep backups—the same logic that had given rise to the full-wipe panic button.
{EXTRACT} was an easy glyph to draw, weave, and use, at least in the context of my jeans where the two things I was trying to separate were clearly different physical matter. In a more abstract case, I’d need more glyphs to clarify the exact semantics of what I was targeting. Here, it was just a matter of drawing some blazing thread—which this time felt a little like applying an ice-cold cheese grater to my lungs, for some reason—weaving the glyph into its characteristic V shape, tearing out the sheet of paper, placing it point-first over the stain, and kind of pulling the lattice over the end of the trouser leg, not unlike applying {COMPOSE}.
There wasn’t much to see. The effect was instantaneous; the lines of graphite had turned to black soot where the power of the Flame had seared the sheet of A5 notebook paper. I was left with clean jeans—for a given value of clean—and a little rust-red pile of dusty dried blood, no more than a teaspoon, sitting on one end of the now-burnt-out V. I wrinkled my nose at the acrid smell of the singed paper wafting up from where the glyph had been consumed. I crumpled up the paper around the blood, hunted around for a rubbish bin, found it on the opposite side of the bed from the nightstand, and tossed the waste. Like {ASH}, this was a consumptive, one-time-use glyph that ruined its substrate afterward.
I was in the process of shimmying into the trousers when there was a knock on my door.
“Who is it?”
“Alice. Felt a ripple. Was that you?”
It occurred to me belatedly that there might be some kind of procedure around using magic in the house, especially if I wasn’t particularly keeping track of the ripple. {EXTRACT} was blue-orange, not red, so I hadn’t figured it’d be a problem for Amane. Was that a bad assumption? I replied cautiously.
“Yeah, just getting the blood off my jeans.”
“Ah, thought it might have been you putting the prosthetic back on. Have you?”
I had been putting that off until after I got dressed, since I hadn’t been sure whether I’d need to take off the numbing patch, and I wanted to spend as little time in pain as possible.
“Was just about to.”
“Ah, good. I’ve got Ebi here. Mind if we come in?”
“Sure, one sec.”
I shimmied on my pants the rest of the way, carefully tugging up the denim around the end of my foot so as to not rub the still-softened flesh of the cauterization against the fabric. The fact that I couldn’t feel anything below my ankle played hell with my proprioception while I couldn’t see it; I kept having to feel around with my hand to make sure I knew where the half-foot was. I called for them to enter once I buttoned the trousers and got my shirt on.
Alice came in first, brightening as she saw me. “You look better.” Then she frowned. “Oh. You should shave. Let me go get a razor.”
“Um—I’m fine.”
But she had already left again, brushing past Ebi.
“There she goes. How’s the foot?”
“Painless, no thanks to you. How’s Amane?”
“Up and about. Hina’s making breakfast for her. I brought you a gift.”
She tossed something back and forth between her hands, a stout cylinder like a can of cat food. Bigger than that, though, maybe twice the diameter.
“That the stabilizer people keep talking about?”
“Yep. Prosthetic first, though. Pull up that pant leg for me.”
I complied as she retrieved the prosthetic from where I had put it on the floor, next to the nightstand. She knelt down to inspect the site.
“Healing looks good. You’ve been through all this before, so I’ll spare you the details. Did you put your cream on it?”
“No. Should I?”
“No, it’ll make it too soft.”
She handed me the prosthetic. I blinked, looking from it to her.
“What, that’s it? Just put it on and turn it on?”
“Yep.”
“What about the patch?”
“Won’t cross-interfere. You can keep it on until we link this up.” She hefted the stabilizer for emphasis.
“What’s in it?”
That’s when Alice returned, empty-handed. “Somehow we don’t have any spares around. You could use mine?”
Her voice went up in pitch at the end, turning the statement into a probing question. It felt gross to use someone else’s razor. Grosser than the itchy feeling of my now five-day-old stubble? Maybe not, but she didn’t need to know that, and I didn’t want to impose.
“I’m good…thanks.”
“You should,” Ebi cut in. “They might take an ID photo today, right?”
“I mean, they might, but that doesn’t mean he has to shave. Ezzen?”
If they were going to take a photo of me, that was totally different. I hated being in pictures to begin with, and the stubble was just ugly. But changing my mind in front of people was hard. I scratched my stubble, feeling the length. I’d feel better, clean-shaven, but something was stopping me from admitting it.
“Do you think I should? We’re sort of on the clock here, right?”
Opal hesitated. Ebi didn’t.
“Yeah, you’re all scruffy. Do you usually let it grow out this long?”
“Er, no, I…I guess. I don’t like to, it just sort of happens.”
Ebi made an exaggerated face in her digital visor. “Ugh. Organics. The idea of having thousands of little hairs all over my surface…yuck.”
I completely knew what she meant. I wasn’t super hairy, but I did have a fair bit on my arms, legs, and chest. It was gross, and it got everywhere. I’d have preferred to have no hair at all, save maybe on my head. It was actually one of the more ridiculous things that attracted me to the Vaetna: the smooth and flat surfaces of carapace, their second skin, called to me. But for me, there was no point in shaving it all when it’d grow back in a few weeks at most.
I wasn’t quite willing to expose all of this to them, not the parts involving the Vaetna. Something about that was buried too deep. But Ebi did embolden me to admit part of it.
“It’s…yeah, it’s pretty gross, huh. Wish I could just get rid of it all.”
Opal blinked. “You could. There’s, like, a thousand laser hair removal clinics in Tokyo. Yuuka went to one for her legs.”
“Oh.” But that was a girl thing, wasn’t it? Was that fine? I wasn’t sure…but I could at least assert control of my face, for now, if I was going to be spending more time around people. And it wasn’t that gross to use somebody else’s razor, not with a clean head. “Cool. I’ll think about it. Um…yeah, I’ll shave, Alice, thanks.”
Why did that feel so good to say? Was it because I was into her? I certainly hoped not; I wanted her firmly out of the part of my head that Hina lived in.
Opal nodded. “I’ll get it.”
Ebi watched her go. She turned back to me and waggled her virtual eyebrows in a way that I was sure no human could actually do.
“Cute.”
“I’m not into her.”
“Did I say that? I didn’t say that. Just nice to see you becoming friends with them.”
I blushed, but didn’t dignify that with a response. I was already wasting enough of everybody’s time; no need to spend more on banter. I picked up my prosthetic, giving it a cursory inspection, before placing it against my burn, grateful for the fact that it was still totally numb down there.
“How long do these patches last?”
“Until the adhesive wears off. Three days? Why?”
“Just curious.”
My fingers worked at the edge of the little grippy sleeve going around the perimeter of the prosthetic, where it met with my foot, making sure it wasn’t folded over onto itself anywhere. Once it seemed aligned, I tugged on the lattice embedded in my prosthetic without fanfare, activating the {AFFIX}. I didn’t actually feel it bind to my foot, because the whole area was still numbed by the patch.
“Alright, it’s on.” I tapped the patch, feeling nothing. “Now how do I take this off? Should I deactivate the lattice first?”
“Oh, let me. The trick is to peel it off slowly so you don’t get punched in the face by the pain, but Amane says it’s hard to do that herself.”
That made sense. Nobody in their right mind would want to gradually ramp up the pain they were feeling. She gripped the corner of the patch.
“I’m going to pull it off over the course of six seconds, and the effect will get weaker as I go, so the pain will get stronger. I’ll count it out. Once I start, I’m not going to stop, okay?”
I squeezed my eyes shut, bracing for it. She poked my knee.
“Relax, the analgesoid in the prosthetic is already active, it won’t be that bad. There won’t be a moment of changeover like with the circle.”
“If you say so.” I took a deep breath anyway; I didn’t entirely trust her. “Ready.”
“Alright. Here…we…go.”
I had been braced for her to pull it all off in one tug, despite what she had said, just like every time I had ever removed a band-aid. But true to her word, she began to peel the patch off my leg slowly.
“Six.”
The generalized numbness vanished first. I could feel the bed’s blanket against my heel, and proprioception for the area came back online, confirming where my leg was relative to the rest of my body.
“Five.”
Then the pain began. First, the throb at the site of the actual cauterization, which began as a dull ache. Beyond that, the skin around my ankle was suddenly aware of the airflow in the room, and while it didn’t hurt, I did gasp. As promised, Ebi didn’t stop.
“Four.”
I became aware of the pain of the patch itself being pulled off my skin, and the pain at my burn increased, becoming sharper, spikier, like a papercut scaled up by a factor of a hundred. I reached for my foot; my instincts insisted that blood should still be oozing out from there, even though I knew rationally that it wouldn’t. I felt Ebi’s free hand gently push mine away before I regained control.
“Three.”
It grew more intense still, and I ground my teeth. I whispered a soft “fuck.”
“Two.”
My ankle hurt, too. Why did my ankle hurt? It wasn’t supposed to. Had I actually damaged it when I had fallen on it?
“One.”
I felt the patch fully come away from my skin. Now the pain was at full clarity.
“Ow. Ow. Fucking ow.” I sucked in a breath through my teeth. “Are you sure the prosthetic’s online?”
“Yeah.”
“Shit. Ow.” It hadn’t hurt that much last night. “Please tell me the stabilizer is going to help more with this.”
“It should. Want me to link it up?”
I snarled at her.
“Are you fucking with me? Do it already.”
“Alright, yeesh.” She proffered the cylinder. “Take it and tug.”
I did. It was so much easier to find the leading point on the lattice when I was in this much pain, as my Flame reared up and responded, alert, closer to the surface of my senses. The cylinder twisted in my hands as though rotated by some invisible axle, and—
Aha. As the pain cleared, I thought I understood the principle. The device in my hands was like a gyroscope, in a way; it naturally wanted to stand up. And somehow, the lattice in the stabilizer was linked to the lattice in my foot and transmitted that abstract ‘stand up’ concept to the prosthetic. It didn’t grant sensation to the false toes, nor control of them, but there was a kind of intuitive balancing force being applied. The pain in my cauterized stump had been shoved down back to the throb back when Ebi had said “five”—bearable enough to stand. I looked up at Ebi.
“Help me up.”
She offered me a hand, and I stood on my own two feet. No crutches, no hobbling, an acceptable amount of—pain. I sat back down hurriedly.
“Fuck.”
“Analgesoid not taking?”
“No, the burn’s fine, it’s—I might have twisted my ankle when I…”
“When you fell in the shower, yup. No need to be shy about it.”
“I thought you’d make fun of me.”
“For being a dork, not for needing medical attention. I thought you knew better than to be coy with your doctor.” She turned. “Opal, get in here, I know you’re waiting out there for an appropriate moment. This is it.”
Alice reappeared, looking a little shamefaced at having been called out on her eavesdropping. She had a safety razor and some shaving cream, but put them both on the bed, looking at me with concern.
“Ezzen? I thought you said your foot was fine. Er—‘fine’ by the standards of your injury, pardon me.”
I rubbed my ankle, experimentally angling it this way and that to see what made it hurt, wincing when I found that any significant tilt was sending spikes of pain up my leg. It actually hurt more than the burn did. “Apology accepted. I thought it was fine!”
Ebi looked at it. “Hm, I’m not seeing much swelling. Opal, will your schedule shatter into a thousand pieces if we lose fifteen minutes icing this?”
The last thing I wanted was to be a burden. “No, it’s fine, I can walk.” To demonstrate, I stood, though I couldn’t keep the grimace off my face. Ebi was shaking her head, and Alice had a dubious look on her face, but neither stopped me from rising. “I mean, yeah, it hurts. But…how long’ll it be in the car? We are driving, right?”
“Half an hour, call it.”
I sat back down, continuing to experiment with my ankle. “Then I’ll ice it on the way. It’ll be mostly sitting once we’re there, right? Unless Japan is loads different from the UK.”
“You really don’t need to push it. We’re not in a hurry.”
“Let him make a mistake,” Ebi declared as she produced a gel-filled ice pack from her hidden higher-dimensional pharmacy. “That’s how people learn!” She wrapped it in my discarded bath towel and handed it to me. “Or so I hear.”
I examined the utterly mundane ice pack she had handed me, then directed a questioning glance up at her.
“We do have anti-inflammatory patches, but they’re not great. Can’t beat regular ice for something like this,” she explained.
I created a list of magitech to improve upon and inserted that at the top, for later, as I tied the ice pack around my ankle. Good enough for keeping it iced while I shaved—I felt like I might as well get that far in what I had planned to do today, even if this were to wind up derailing the rest. Besides, I really only needed one foot for support while shaving; another slip like earlier was unlikely with the sink’s soft bath mat underfoot. Ebi said something to Alice in Japanese, who frowned.
“Rude.”
“But accurate.”
Alice didn’t dignify it with a response, turning to me. “See you downstairs?”
I nodded.
—
Walking, even with the stabilizer, was painful. I was loath to put weight on my foot, and as I descended the stairs with a clean-shaven face, I took pains to do so one-by-one, never putting all my weight on my right leg. It was slow going, and would have been humiliating if not for Hina’s enthusiastic waving. Instead, it was just embarrassing.
“He walks! Everything okay with your leg, cutie? Stabilizer treating you okay?”
“Yeah,” I called back, “It’s not my burn, it’s my ankle.”
Hina winced. “Oof, yeah. Heard you fall earlier. Don’t go around getting yourself hurt without me, ‘kay?” There was a possessive edge to the delivery that undercut her otherwise cheerful and teasing tone that made me shiver.
She had claimed the beanbag we had shared, lounging all splayed out with her arms and legs hanging over the edge. The rest of Todai, sans Heliotrope, was scattered around the sitting area. Amane was sitting with Alice at the low table where we had eaten breakfast earlier, eating pancakes—blueberry or plain, I couldn’t tell—and a milkshake, probably the same fortified variety I’d had yesterday. Alice was at her side, on her laptop, with Ebi remaining standing opposite her. Ai remained insensate on the sofa where I had seen her last.
Hina looked over at her teammate’s sleeping form. “Man, she worked so hard on it, and she’s too busy being asleep to see it in action.”
“You helped too, didn’t you?”
“I sure did. I actually did most of the weaving.”
“Then, uh, thanks. How does it work, exactly?”
“Oh, y’know, it’s a gyroscope plus some other stuff. Links to your foot. Magic, am I right?”
I had gotten that far on my own, thank you very much. Opal called over to us, shutting her laptop. “Don’t bother trying to get that kind of stuff out of Hina. Ai will—sorry, Emerald, that still gets us too sometimes—will send it to you when she’s up. None of that’s classified, but feel free to call it your first bit of Todai insider info that you have the okay to post on the forums.”
I smiled despite myself, and that just made me more embarrassed. Amane waved hello at me, and I waved back. She muttered something to Opal.
“Yes, it’s pretty much time to go. Last call, Ezzen—do you feel ready to enter the bureaucratic labyrinth and lock horns with its fearsome minotaur?”
I hadn’t taken Opal for a jokester, and it wasn’t at all clear to me from her tone or expression whether it was serious.
“Um. No? I signed up for paperwork and shopping, I think.” I looked down at my foot. “I don’t think I’m really qualified to be fighting any minotaurs until this is healed, anyway.”
Silence reigned for a moment. Then Hina dissolved into giggles. They spread to Opal next. Even Ebi indulged a good-natured chuckle. Amane was grinning, but it was the polite smile of incomprehension, befuddled by her friends’ infection of mirth. A victim of the language barrier; how exclusive, if inadvertently. I wished I spoke enough Japanese to at least follow along so they could speak that instead and she wouldn’t feel left out. I saw Opal whisper an explanation to her as I approached, still a bit unsteady on my feet. Ebi began to narrate in a female but otherwise spot-on impression of David Attenborough.
“And thus the Ezzen, freshly-groomed, takes on the role of the jester. Experts speculate that this is some sort of courtship display. Indeed, it seems this theory may hold some water, as a female flamebearer decides to draw close, inspecting her prospective mate’s—”
Hina snapped her fingers a few times, and the robot shut up, but the damage was done. “Mate” sure was an evocative word, one I tried and failed to file away in my mind as she circled me. I felt as though I was being sized up.
“You do look better after a shave, cutie. Missed a spot, though.” Hina ran a finger along my neck. I twitched at the contact. For a moment the pressure turned to searing pain accompanied by a high-pitched whine, and I jerked again, harder. I coughed at the acrid smell of burnt hair. She removed her finger from my neck, holding it up. “Laser hair removal, in-house!”
I stared at her, attraction and betrayal fighting for supremacy. “I said to warn me.”
“Oh. Oops. Sorry…”
She deflated, sounding so genuinely crushed that I instantly felt bad. I opened my mouth to apologize myself and clarify, but was drowned out by an avalanche of Japanese. Amane’s tirade—and I was sure that was what it was, language barrier notwithstanding—lasted a solid thirty seconds. Hina’s dejection started to metamorphose into anger near the end, and after a few seconds of tense silence that hung like a noose, she snapped back at her teammate. Then Alice cut in, and suddenly all three of them were yelling. I took a few sidling steps over toward Ebi.
“Help?”
“Oh, it’s nothing big. You know how Alice called me rude earlier?”
“Yeah? What did you say?”
“That you were being stubborn like Amane. This is what I meant.”
“I don’t follow. What happened?”
Opal heard me and switched to English. “Hina, that’s not fair.”
“Of course it is! This is what I am, every bit as much as Amane’s…shinkeisonshou is her. It’s none of her business how I choose to have my fun. Or yours!”
“It absolutely is, because you’re this close to bringing the PCTF to our fucking doorstep and—” Alice forcibly cut herself off and took a deep breath, looking at me. “Sorry, Ezzen. We should be…I don’t know. Including you in this? It’s complicated.”
“Did I do something?”
“Other than get flametouched, no.” Hina groused, genuine annoyance in her voice for the first time since I had met her.
Ebi sighed. “It’s not so much about you as it’s about pain.” She pointed at Hina and Amane. “With those two, it always is.”
They showed no signs of stopping. Amane’s body language was surprisingly animated for somebody who had been bedridden just earlier this morning, if my understanding was correct. Hina practically barked back at her. Whatever they were exactly talking about, it clearly wasn’t the first time, and I felt very…talked around. There were things not being said, and what was being said wasn’t in languages I understood. Opal stood, taking her laptop with her. She did interrupt Amane briefly to give her a kneeling, delicate half-hug, and gave Hina a single pat on the head as she passed by. Hina didn’t turn to look at us, but she did throw up a peace sign and waggle it around even as she spoke to Amane in terms that sounded less than cordial. Ai, for her part, remained fast asleep. I was a little envious. Opal gestured toward the elevator.
“Let’s go.”
“We’re just…leaving?”
“Can’t be helped. I’ll try to explain on the way, but…there’s some other things we need to discuss, too, and there’s never enough time. Just know that it’s not really your fault. It’s always been like this between them, you’ve just…catalyzed things by your presence. It’s Hina being Hina, I’m sure you already get what I mean by that.”
As she led me to the elevator, it seemed to me like “Hina being Hina” was a fair summation of many of Todai’s problems. Perhaps even most of them.
I was soon to learn she barely made the top five.
Author’s Note:
Ezzen’s poor spear. It’s trying its best. (unbelievably, not a euphemism!)
Extra special thanks to the beta readers for putting in overtime for the last few hours of editing this. Cassiopeia, Softies, Zak, Maria: You guys rock.
Join the Discord to discuss the story and hang out with other Sunspot readers!
Join the Patreon to support the story and read chapters three weeks ahead of public!
My foot and stomach dragged me out of oblivion, blaring in chorus that my body needed maintenance. I rolled onto my front, face directly into the pillow, protesting against their insistence, but that just made my foot proclaim more loudly that it needed attention. I groped blindly for my phone in the dark, wincing. I couldn’t find it for a moment; the nightstand was further away than it had been in my old apartment.
ezzen: Foot hurts more. Maybe 6/10?
ezzen: Also gm
ebi-furai: on it
Ebi understood what was important in life: painkillers.
ebi-furai: gimme a couple minutes
ebi-furai: amethyst is asleep, just making sure shes stable enough for me to ditch
My phone’s clock read 7:28 when I heard knocking and the mechanical click of the door opening, followed by the tap-tap of Ebi’s feet on the hardwood.
“How’d you sleep?”
“Woke up…twice? Opal yelling at Sapphire and…an earthquake, I think?”
I’d also had a weird dream, but that was par for the course, and the details had already faded. Something about ice? Hina had also been there too; my subconscious had a lot to work through.
“Not an earthquake.”
“Then—argh. Bright.”
I squeezed my eyes shut in protest at the lights, groaning. I heard Ebi pace over to the bedside as I gingerly tried to hold my eyes open for long enough to adjust.
“Leg.”
She waited for me to pull down the blanket and extract my leg as I continued to rub my eyes. Pain at both ends of my body—think about something else.
“Not an earthquake?”
“Amethyst didn’t have a great night.”
The burned stump was looking about as good as you could ask at this stage of healing—which was to say, not very good at all. It was an angry melding of red, purple, and brown, some areas glistening with a thin layer of pus. Ebi leaned over it, humming a jaunty melody in chiptune.
“Don’t put the prosthetic back on until you bathe and clean it. I can give you a local analgesic patch and some…I think this is aspirin.”
“You think?”
“Pretty sure.”
I eyed the unlabeled bottle that had appeared in her hand while I had been looking at the burned flesh, reasonably sure she was screwing with me.
“Patch first, please. It’s magic?”
“{NULL}-{SEVER} on red, same thing that your bed was using.”
I vaguely resented that she told me outright instead of letting me piece it together. I couldn’t quite recall what I had seen in the spell circle Ai had used yesterday for comparison; probably less precise than that, but I’d take general numbness over pain.
“Go for it.”
Her hand not holding the pill bottle did the rotating-twisting thing a few times.
“How’s that work, anyway?”
“I have a little warehouse pharmacy thing tucked into fourspace. There’s a little arm in there that grabs the thing I need and passes it to one of my external hands.”
How eldritch. Her hand blurred and was now holding the patch, which could have been mistaken for a largeish band-aid, maybe five inches by two inches. I could see the glyphs printed on the surface; in miniature relative to the ones I had drawn during my flight from the PCTF, but in the real world, this was a fairly typical size, small as it could realistically go while remaining weavable with the naked eye and bare hand. Her hand did a fascinating contortion to peel the backing from the patch solo.
Ebi tapped my shin with her knuckle. I shook my head. She did it again, a little lower, and continued until I flinched, right above my ankle. She smoothed the patch against my skin at the indicated height—no change in sensation at all. Did the patch’s orientation matter? Surely, she hadn’t applied it upside down.
“How’s that?”
“It’s not on.”
“Yeah. These are the ones the Radiances use, so they’re self-woven. It’s just empty substrate right now.”
“You didn’t tell me this before because…?”
“You’re going to be doing this a lot. It’s just first-order; Amethyst does this first thing every morning.”
I exhaled a long sigh. It was true that it was about the simplest first-order 2-chain I could ask for, in theory, but I had never actually woven multiple glyphs on a chain like this. Completing the glyphs themselves was the easy part, just a matter of following the guide laid out by the substrates—I had referred to it in my Glyphcraft 101 blog series as “coloring within the lines.” In reality, though, the process was much more finicky. I had to link the glyphs with the correct tension for the desired color of ripple, which was something you supposedly just did ‘by feel’ or with a ripple display. Which I didn’t have.
I glared at her narrow grin, both too hungry and in too much pain to appreciate games. Was this how she treated Amethyst?
“And you’re making me do it blind, first thing in the morning? No display? I haven’t…”
Of course I hadn’t done it before, but it was still awkward to admit that. It clashed with my self-image as an expert…which had grown remarkably more fragile in the past 48 hours, but it was too early in the morning to confront that.
“I believe in you!”
Furthermore, I really doubted she didn’t have a display somewhere in her toolbox, but she shrugged, a weird motion on her mechanical frame. It wasn’t entirely clear how her shoulders actuated to make it happen.
“Let the record show that I resent you for this. Bedside manner?”
“Used it all up on Amethyst, sorry. Hop to it.”
If I got it wrong and linked on something like blue or orange—well, it wouldn’t be apocalyptic or even dangerous, but I’d have to start over until I got it right. Ugh. The silver lining was that I already had an abundance of pain to work with, so I could postpone the moral quandary of harming my Flame. I gritted my teeth and adjusted my leg to bring it closer to me so I could better see the glyphs printed on the patch while I nudged the thing attached to my soul. Hey, Flame, look! It hurts like shit, isn’t that exciting?
I wasn’t quite sure what to make of the fact that talking to it like a dog worked so well. My right hand ignited in white, sparks curling in impossible directions as I clenched my fist and willed the fire to twist into a bundle of twine. Still no properly prepared, silken skein, but…remarkably better than the first times I had woven. It wasn’t burning me anymore, just deeply uncomfortable. Was that just because I’d had some time to acclimate…or had something happened due to my contact with Hina’s Flame?
I didn’t want to think about it, and it didn’t matter right now. Right hand and right ankle—the angle was a little awkward, but I started pushing the thread through the {NULL} glyph. For such a simple concept, it was a fancy glyph; the overall shape was something like a W with the end prongs shorter than the middle, but forming that larger shape involved a few henna-esque spirals and some gradienting in the middle not dissimilar to {ASH}. The spirals were ornamented with smaller loops; in the case of the patch, they were pretty much the smallest physical size you could make a glyph component while still having it be reasonable to weave outside a laboratory. The upshot was that it was quite lenient on the tension gradient required to make it work; most of the detailing was in the shapes itself, and that was easy enough to just follow the substrate for. My execution definitely wasn’t the cleanest, since the thread itself was still awful quality, but it went acceptably well until I reached the part where I had to link it to the next glyph in the chain.
“Couldn’t you—I don’t know, at least give me some tips? Or get one of the Radiances?”
“Sapphire’s making breakfast, Opal is keeping an eye on Amethyst, and Ai is finishing up your stabilizer.” Her digital brow furrowed. “We forgot to mention that last night. Anyway, everyone’s busy, and I’m not qualified to talk you through this.”
“Opal filled me in on the stabilizer. What do you mean not qualified?”
I was actually a little surprised that Opal apparently hadn’t mentioned the contents of our conversation last night to Ebi, considering that they had presumably spent the night in the same room. I supposed I should be grateful that she was keeping some confidentiality regarding what had occurred between me and Hina—I was getting derailed.
“Just because I’m made of LM doesn’t mean I know the tricks.”
“You’re lying.”
It would be incredibly embarrassing if she wasn’t, but this was one of the few things I had any confidence in.
“I am. But it’s basic first-aid that you should learn how to do without tools. Even if you didn’t have your own pain to manage, these things are like half the reason Amethyst can function.”
“You said she applied them herself, though?”
“On good days.”
The appeal to empathy got the better of me. I pushed the thread across the gap between the glyphs, trying to tug it to the approximate range of tension that would get it to resonate with red ripple. It wasn’t so simple as rainbow order; red was on the higher end, between green and white. I tugged as hard as I dared, until the {NULL} I had woven felt like it would burst out of the substrate in a shower of hissing sparks, and backed off on the tension from there until it was at what I hoped was about 80% taut. There were ways of knotting and binding the thread at the end of a glyph to more naturally guide the right amount of tension for this step, but I had only ever interacted with those in the abstracted notation of GWalk diagrams, so I really was going entirely by feel. I was once again struck by the sense that my perspective until now had been too narrow.
Part of the trick of it was that, like with an actual strand of thread, applying tension made it longer, so even though I thought I was at the right amount of tension, I had overshot the beginning of the {SEVER} substrate. This meant I had to tug on various points further back in the first glyph to increase the tension from that end instead, which made the leading edge too short now, and I kept struggling with it back and forth, beginning to redden under Ebi’s observation. The damn thing was just so fiddly, and—I exhaled in frustration, and it came out as almost a growl.
“Can this wait until after breakfast?”
“If you think you can handle the pain, sure. Or you could shower now so you can put the prosthetic back on.”
“…I’ll take that aspirin.”
—
Last night, I had managed to stubbornly limp around my room without my crutches. Today, with the full brunt of the pain in my caramelized stump, that wasn’t an option. It was back to tripod Ezzen for now. We exited the elevator after its single-floor journey to find that Hina had indeed colonized the kitchen. Mixing bowls and measuring cups lay in—well, my read of her personality would have assumed disarray, but it seemed that she ran a tight ship in this aspect of her life, if nowhere else. Things were stacked fairly neatly, and she was actually in the middle of putting away some spare dishes as we approached. The smell in the air suggested something involving batter. She called out with her back to us.
“Irasshaimase! Paaaancakes! Hot and fresh! Come get some!”
Something in the cadence of her delivery suggested a history in food service—she must have had a life before this, strange as that prospect was. She turned to face us, and those blue eyes found mine. For a moment, I was buffeted by a memory of something that had never happened, cracks spiking radially outward—
“Plain or blueberry?”
“Huh?”
“Plain. Or. Blueberry?”
She enunciated each word with a grin. She had done the same thing last night—I was being teased. My eyes slid down from the impossible blue to her lips, then chest covered by an apron reading…“Eat The Cook.” Don’t get caught on the implications of that—stop looking at her boobs—keep going—I looked instead at the cooking supplies arrayed before her. That had been maybe the longest second of my life.
“Oh. Um—blueberry, please.”
“You got it.” She raised her voice, as though calling out to nonexistent kitchen coworkers. “Blueberry shortstack combo!” She turned to Ebi. “And for the lady?”
“Morning, Hina. Amethyst would like blueberry as well, when she’s up and can keep food down. I’ll go get Opal.”
She made for the stairs. She was going to leave me with Hina again? Well…maybe that was fine? My own impulses seemed like more of a problem than her, at least right now. Case in point, as I watched the fascinating geometries of Ebi’s back shift as she climbed the stairs, it felt a bit like ogling—even though she didn’t really have a butt. The moment the robot was out of earshot, Hina purred, leaning onto the counter. I hadn’t noticed with my eyes locked on hers earlier, but she had most of her hair up in a lazy bun, though the hair framing her face was just as it had been yesterday, to my memory.
“Hey, cutie. Nice shirt.”
I twisted to look for whomever she was talking to, but it was just me—then looked down at the Sailor Moon shirt Opal had given me last night, blushing. I felt the need to clarify.
“It—doesn’t mean anything. You ruined the only other one I had.”
“Yep. Won’t do it to that one, though, it’s one of Alice’s favorites. Mine too. Smells like her.” She let that hang for a moment. “Did you sleep okay?”
As per usual, I deflected. It was easier when I was in pain.
“Um. Well enough, but my leg really hurts. I tried to weave one of those pain blocker patches, but…”
“Ebi’s being a bully, got it. Want me to show you?”
I reddened, even knowing that the blatant innuendo was completely intentional. The embarrassment was tempered with relief, though, because I had been worried that whatever strange fetish she had for pain would extend to refusing to help with the damage to my foot.
“I, um, don’t want to interrupt breakfast—”
“It’ll just take a sec.” She pointed at a beanbag chair, a medium grey cast warmly by the lights of the common space, soft and inviting compared to the perpetual mild discomfort of the crutches. In the windows beyond, the sun had only just begun to crest the skyscrapers. “Make yourself comfortable.”
I crutch-hobbled over to the indicated bag and gingerly attempted to lower myself into it, dropping myself the last few inches with a thud and wince. It was comfortable enough, but I had wound up being a little more trapped in the plush than I had intended, which triggered the faintest panic response as Hina approached. Black leggings hugged her swaying hips. She leaned down to me at the waist with effortless balance, almost a gymnast’s stretch.
“No fake foot?”
“Uh—Ebi said I should clean it first, and I didn’t want to do that before bre—oof.”
I was interrupted by her tossing herself bodily next to me on the beanbag. She rolled to bring her torso against mine, the two of us momentarily half-cocooned as our combined weight pushed the beanbag up around us.
“Good morning.”
Those blue eyes stared me down from an inch away. My heart was in my throat.
“Um. Morning. Didn’t…didn’t Opal talk to you about…?”
“About us? Yeah, but this is medicinal.” Her hand slid under my shirt, roving upward to my chest. “Seriously, if you want me to help you weave, I need some up-close access.” Her other hand found the scarred fingers of my right, rubbing her thumb against my palm. She was having fun with this. “I mean, that’s totally an excuse, but it’s still true.”
She clawed at my chest, and my Flame responded, lancing down through my arm and into my scars, igniting them once more. My hand spasmed for a moment, and I sucked in a breath. Hina also made a noise, something that sounded suspiciously like a whining moan. I froze.
“Um.”
She nuzzled me.
“That was a good sound, don’t worry. Damn, you burn hot.”
She brought her hand around and laced her fingers through mine from the back—my flames were burning her skin. That’s what she had moaned at? This was why she was willing to help me? Pain for pain, like she had said?
“Your hand.”
“Mm. Yeah.” Her contented sigh was a disturbing juxtaposition to the way her skin was cracking and peeling as the odor of charring meat rose into the air. “Don’t worry about it. It’s really good. You ready?”
“I—yeah.”
“Good. O—hokay, bring your leg up. Knee to chest, so you can reach the glyphs.”
I complied, feeling a bit ridiculous, but happy to do as she asked. This was as hands-on as it got, and so much less predatory than what we had done last night. Perhaps equally off-putting, with her masochistic obsession with the Flame on full display, but I wasn’t in danger from her here. This was fully cooperative, mutual. Intimate.
She guided my hand toward the glyph, and even though I couldn’t quite see what was happening down there, I could feel her spinning the flame into thread. It was finer than what I could do myself; the same as what Ai had done yesterday, except the skein wrapped around both our hands, binding them together. She whispered in my ear, breathing harder now.
“Don’t look at it. Go by feel, you already know the shape, right?”
“Y—yeah.” I shut my eyes and tried to visualize the first glyph, the {NULL} with its modified W shape, and—
“What the hell, Hina.”
“Shhhh. Alice, you know I love you, but shut up, we’re right in the middle of this. Don’t break his focus.”
“I—no, get off of him and come make pancakes.”
“Yeah, yeah, just a sec.” Hina lowered her voice to whisper to me, a giggle reverberating in her chest. “Ignore her, finish the weave, you can do it.”
I tried. Into the start of the W, then the zigzag, then the ridged spirals that looped over themselves until the middle of the W—I could hear footsteps on the stairs, accompanied in rhythm by a third sound as Opal’s tail thumped with displeasure behind her. How did the next set of spirals go, clockwise or counterclockwise? Hina saw me hesitate.
“Clockwise. More tension as you come around.”
Right, so that the link wouldn’t be too long. She hummed in approval as I finished the first glyph.
“Do you know the trick for linking on red?”
I blushed. “Um—no.”
“You just loop at the end of—oh, for fuck’s sake, Alice, let him work.” I felt her sit up halfway, tugging my hand away from the patch for a moment. “Sorry, cutie. Keep going! Loop it back through the last two spirals—yeah, good. Listen, Alice, if you want pancakes one minute sooner, the batter’s right there, be my guest.”
One minute? Her expectations of me were high. Also, it was very hard to focus while the label “cutie” bounced around in my head, but I gave it a spirited go. My eyes were still closed, but I felt how the trick contorted the end of the W and applied enough tension that the thread wound up being in the right spot, so I didn’t have to guess as I tugged the string across the gap between glyphs. Then it was just a matter of weaving the {SEVER}, which, true to its theme, was a bisected diamond, filled in with more mildly intricate internal designs—but still nothing particularly difficult, and there was a certain fractal regularity to the shapes, so it was easy enough to remember. Jumping across the bisection to the other side of the diamond was done with a single line, not unlike the inter-glyph link I had just woven from {NULL} to {SEVER}. Then finishing the glyph was just a matter of mirroring the first half—though done in reverse—and tying off the end.
“Good job. Apply it.”
That was Opal, who had evidently resigned herself to watching. I took the trailing end of the thread and…
“Planar, right? So, er…through?”
“Yep, like you’re cutting it off!”
Hina didn’t have to sound quite so excited about that. But I took the thread and pulled it taut to the other side of my leg, then dragged it through the limb like cheese wire—I choked, gritting my teeth, squeezing my eyes further shut. The searing pain was too reminiscent of when I had first cauterized this site, even down to the flat plane of separation—and then the pain vanished, as did all other sensation below the point of the patch. The magic had worked. I took a deep breath and relaxed into the plush, savoring the absence of the pain that had been a constant background presence since the moment I had woken up. Hina flopped back down next to me, and I opened my eyes to see that hers were shut as she lay against me. She purred.
“Good job. That hurt, right?”
“Yeah?”
“Yay!” She pulled her hand off of mine as the magic thread dissolved in a hiss, holding it next to mine and splaying out the fingers. She reopened those blue eyes and smiled at me. “We’re twinning!”
Logic dictated she should be in far more pain than me, with the way her hand was already blistering, but I’d never have guessed from her peppy tone or beatific grin. The only indicator was how a wince flickered across her face as she brought her hand up—and flipped off Opal, who was standing over us. The dragon did not look pleased; her brow was furrowed atop those almost-incandescent orange gems with their slitted pupils, and her mouth was pursed in a not-quite-frown.
“Pancakes. Not—this. Christ, Hina.”
Her lack of concern for the actual state of Hina’s hand was remarkable. The nauseatingly familiar stench of burned meat in the air spoke for itself, and yet neither Radiance seemed concerned at the sight that would have had me running for the cold water and looking up directions to the hospital. The girl snuggling next to me chirped back at her teammate, equally heedless of the injury.
“Yep, mhm, on it.”
There was a whoosh of air as the space next to me was suddenly vacated; Sapphire had pulled herself to her feet and across the room in one motion, with no leverage. As I reeled from the momentary disorientation, I swore I felt the ghost of her lips on my cheek. Opal’s frown deepened, and she sighed—then seemed to decide to put it behind her, offering me a hand, clean and well-manicured, a far cry from the old damage inflicted on mine or the fresh burns on Hina’s. I stared dumbly at the outstretched limb for a moment.
“Uh—”
“Food first. Yelling after.”
A girl had to have priorities, I supposed. I took her hand, and she pulled me to my feet—well, just the one—and helped me back onto the crutches. It was only a few steps over to the low table Hina had originally indicated before I sat again on one of the pillows, also with Opal’s assistance. She sat to my left and pulled her laptop out of—pocketspace? I still wasn’t entirely used to the way that they could just summon objects at will.
“How’s Amethyst?”
“Stable. She probably won’t come down for breakfast, but she’ll be able to eat.”
“Good.”
Good? Of course it was good, so it was a rather lame comment. I resisted the urge to cringe and fumbled for my phone instead.
“Your post caused some headache this morning.”
My brow furrowed. “The PCTF already knows I’m here, don’t they?”
“Just because you’re not an active kidnapping risk doesn’t mean you can go around leaking information. We were going to do teasers and official announcements and stuff, and you’ve gotten out ahead on that.” She put up a hand placatingly. “I’m not yelling at you, I should have said something last night. Just a…miscommunication, left-hand-right-hand disconnect. Your post is still good PR, just ahead of schedule.”
The smell of cooking pancakes reached our noses simultaneously, and she looked over at the kitchen. Hina hadn’t asked for Opal’s preference like she had for me—but then, she probably already knew. The scent was soon joined by something meaty, probably sausages, which helped banish the smell of callously burned flesh. Or maybe not callous, rather…well, the whole affair had been intentional in a distressingly masochistic sense, for sure, but she had also been…staking a claim? That was what it had sort of felt like: pushing back against Opal’s moratorium on unwanted intimacy. It hadn’t been unwanted, I realized. It had been…fun? I was proud of the weaving, if nothing else, and having Hina so willing to snuggle up against me was…
Complicated, is what it was. I shook off the train of thought. What had Opal been saying about PR? I reread the post I had made and the sleepy replies from later in the night. In the burgeoning light of day, I could see how I had overshared a bit; nothing overly sensitive, but if they had been planning to make it more of a reveal…
“Um. Sorry.”
“It’s fine, we’ll work it out. Did you sleep well, at least?”
I didn’t want to mention that her yelling at Hina had woken me up, but there had been the other thing. “The…shaking woke me up. Not an earthquake, Ebi said?”
“Amane.”
“Oh.”
Amethyst had shaken the entire building…as a side effect? I wasn’t about to ask, and Opal didn’t volunteer any more information.
“Drinks. What do you want? Coffee, tea, juice?”
“What kind of tea?”
She got up. “Let me check. Yuuka’s the only one who drinks it in the morning, so…”
While she ambled over to the kitchen, tail waving behind her, I checked in with my friends. It was a decidedly different crowd in the chatroom from my usual mornings, owing to the time difference.
ezzen: Morning
DendriteSpinner: oh damn it would be morning for you, huh
DendriteSpinner: hows lighthouse
ezzen: Pancakes and paperwork, apparently.
Opal called over from the kitchen.
“Jasmine, Earl Grey, chamomile.”
“Earl Grey, splash of milk…please.”
Nice save, Ez. I did some quick time zone calculations in my head.
ezzen: Star’s asleep, probably?
moth30: hi ez
moth30: and yeah probs
moth30: whats cookin
ezzen: I might be doing some tourism today. Seek to harass her with photos.
DendriteSpinner: lol
Hina brought over the first batch of pancakes, a three-stack of blueberry for me with a pair of sausages on the side. The pancakes were decidedly American diner-style, buttermilk, rather than the fluffy Japanese ones I had seen floating around the internet. I was quite alright with that; I was sure I’d more than exceed my quota for Weird Japanese Stuff today anyways. A pad of butter sat atop the stack, melting into savory gold. My stomach growled.
“Omataseshimashita! Blueberry shortstack combo. Your drink will be out shortly.”
She delivered the plate with a food-service smile and a wink. I thanked her in a mutter. She reached toward me—paused as Opal tutted faintly at her from the kitchen—retracted the hand in a rare display of sheepishness, but didn’t lose the grin. The blisters were already fading, the most explicit sign yet of how her body had been altered. That was an order of magnitude faster than even the eightfold acceleration I had been under when I had first arrived at Todai, and it was innate for her.
“Want anything else, cutie? We have fruit.”
I wasn’t getting any more used to the label. “I—this is good, for now?”
“Mhm.” She went back toward the kitchen, barking something at Opal in Japanese, who replied in an equally aggravated tone as she put the kettle on. Were they fighting over me? No, that was far too self-centered. I wasn’t worth that.
The pancakes were fluffy without being dry, infused with the sweetness of the blueberries. The sausages, pan-fried, had a satisfying snap and burst of fatty juiciness to balance against the sweetness. Hina was a good cook, it seemed—though not as good as Dad. His pancake recipe included a splash of maple syrup in the batter, and he had always served them with jam or preserves instead for a wider range of flavor. The nostalgia stung a bit, like it always did. These were good too, though.
I refocused on the chatroom as I doused the topmost pancake with syrup and spread it around with a sausage speared upon a fork.
OverloadTSS: yo ezzen
OverloadTSS: saw the post
OverloadTSS: what the fuck, dude
ezzen: Right?
In light of the headache I had already caused for Opal, I wasn’t sure if I should say anything more. Besides, my hands were mainly occupied with the task of eating.
moth30: yooooooooo
moth30: ezzen-lighthouse collab papers incoming
ezzen: Well a lot of it is classified but
ezzen: There’ll be something, I think.
OverloadTSS: that rocks
moth30: hey overload
OverloadTSS: heya
ezzen: Apparently I shouldn’t have said anything until they made the announcement?
ezzen: But cat’s out of the bag now so
ezzen: Feel free to include it in this week’s roundup Overload.
OverloadTSS: oof i was almost done editing it
OverloadTSS: next week, probably
OverloadTSS: might do a whole special on your flamefall depending on how the gulf clusterfuck turns out
OverloadTSS: will DM in a bit
ezzen: Sounds good
Opal returned with a steaming mug in each hand. She passed one to me as she sat back down on her pillow, extending her tail out behind her and laying it flat on the carpet. It slid slowly back and forth on the carpet behind her—I bet that felt great. Lit by the kitchen’s warm lights behind me and the growing daylight coming through the window, her scales glittered with the motion. It really was a huge limb, almost an extension of her torso. My eyes naturally followed it up her body.
She was dressed as skimpy as yesterday but not as form-hugging, just loose short shorts and a tank top, the latter half-pushed up around her waist to accommodate the extra limb coming out of her back. Her white hair was a little unruly, reflective like her tail—mine was worse, surely, longer and wavier than hers. And I hadn’t showered in…three days. Ugh. My stubble was also getting just long enough to start itching. Had they given me a razor? Probably not. I was a mess compared to the two; even in this candid, domestic setting, the Radiances really were laughably, intimidatingly pretty. Opal didn’t transfix me in the same way as Hina, but she still drew the eye. What was it like to be so effortlessly attractive?
I realized I had spent too long looking at her when she caught my eye over the edge of her laptop screen.
“What?”
“Sorry.”
I averted my gaze back to the plate in front of me, reddening as I sipped my tea. I had to stop ogling these girls, unusual anatomy or not.
We sat in silence for another couple of minutes until Hina brought over Opal’s plate. This one was towering with pancakes—eight? They looked plain, but I got a distinct whiff of cinnamon as the mountain made tablefall.
“Omataseshimashita! Dragon special.”
Hina also delivered a small plate of sausages and a bowl of fruit, kiwi and mango. All told, it was an intimidating amount of food, far too much for one person, but Opal dug in immediately, tail thumping happily behind her. I watched with fascination and no small amount of horror as three of the pancakes and four sausages disappeared down her gullet in the first minute; only then did she stop, wipe her mouth, and sip her coffee.
“Thanks.”
That was for Hina, who had remained to observe the gobbling. She nodded, satisfied.
“Love you too!”
She bounced back toward the kitchen and got to work on another serving—probably her own. Opal rolled her eyes at that, though the hint of a smile might have crossed her lips for a moment. I experienced the most absurd twinge of jealousy at Hina’s affections being directed toward her teammate and self-admitted best friend. I chided myself; that was entirely unwarranted, given our prior cuddle-tutoring and the memory of her lips brushing my cheek mere minutes ago, to say nothing of last night’s exchange of words and spit. Part of me was still reeling at how fast things were moving between us.
My stomach had simpler priorities. I had worked through two of my pancakes and all my sausages and was eyeing Opal’s fruit a little covetously as I sliced another chunk off my final pancake. Should I flag down Hina? No, she was in the middle of making more pancakes; she might already be waiting on me literally hand and foot, but I still hated feeling like a bother. I should just ask Opal for one of hers; she hadn’t touched them yet, still progressing down her stack of sugar and sin at an alarming pace. I pointed at the halved kiwi with my fork.
“Are…you going to get to that?”
Opal’s mouth was full, but she waved assent. She followed it up with verbal confirmation after a hefty swallow.
“Go for it. You like kiwis?”
“They’re okay.”
“So, not your favorite.”
The conversation hung for a beat before I realized it had been a question.
“Raspberries.”
“Why?”
“Um—they’re juicy.” There was more to it than that—a trip to Oregon with my dad—but I was supposed to ask her something now instead of talking about myself. “Yours?”
She speared the remaining fruit in the bowl, hoisting the cubed slice aloft as a visual aid.
“Mango. Good for smoothies. Apples are nice too, though more as an ingredient than raw, you know?”
I nodded. “I like apple crumble.”
Another thing I hadn’t eaten since that day. Opal was oblivious to the dark thought.
“My dad’s side of the family is from Aomori, up north, which is a major apple region. When we go visit, they always make a bunch of apple stuff. Apple pie, apple katsu, cider, a bunch of types of…juice…” She trailed off as my shoulders tightened. Suddenly I wasn’t hungry, but I kept chewing mechanically.
“Er, Ezzen?”
In hindsight, Hina had noticed as well. I didn’t wind up having to explain my reaction to either of them—even though I probably ought to—because at that moment the elevator opened. I twisted to see Ai trudging toward us, wearing the same clothes as yesterday and looking dead on her feet. Hina chirped something at her. She didn’t respond and just zombied her way over toward us. Instead of stopping at the table, though, she went just past us to the sofa behind Opal and flopped face-first.
“Uh?”
“She’s fine.” Opal turned to look at her teammate and said something to her in Japanese, which only made the Emerald Radiance stir slightly with a grunt. Opal turned back to me. “Your stabilizer is done.”
But at what cost? Hina brought another plate of pancakes and a glass of…protein shake, maybe, to a vacant side of the table, to Opal’s left and opposite from me. Then she put her hands on her hips and strode over to Ai, whose breathing had already steadied out. She was fast asleep and in the process of becoming one with the cushions. Hina sighed.
“What do you think? Let her sleep?”
“She missed dinner. She’ll wake up hangry.”
“She was snacking all night.”
“On senbei, not actual food.”
I surreptitiously looked up the word—rice crackers, residents of that lowest rung of nutrition, kin to popcorn and other such crunchy, insubstantial snacks.
“What do you think, cutie?”
I shifted in my chair. “Why’s it my call?”
“Like you haven’t done this before.”
Somehow, Hina had me dead to rights—Ai’s state was so familiar as to be functionally identical to the nights I had spent working through a bag of crisps, until either I cracked the problem or exhaustion won. Was I that easy to read? Wait—hadn’t Hina been helping and therefore also stayed up during the night? How was she so peppy? Maybe she was just a morning person.
“Um. Fair. Let her sleep and keep the food warm so it’s easy when she wakes up?”
That was a luxury I had never had myself, living alone. Waking up groggy at some random time of day after a marathon like that was always a matter of groping for the nearest, most easily accessible snack food, rather than a nice, real meal. I was jealous—then realized this VIP treatment would also apply to me, were I to stay up and work with Ai. For some reason, that made me blush.
“Mhm! That’s what I’d do, too. But since it’s your call, we can say later that you let her oversleep. Not my fault!”
I was too meek to object to that directly—but I didn’t have to anyway.
“Knock it off, Hina.” Opal made a dismissive motion with her fork in the direction of her teammate. “Don’t worry about her. It’s a Sunday; Ai can sleep in. I’m only taking you to Tochou for paperwork today because the Ministry is essentially screaming at me to do so, otherwise I’d just put it off until tomorrow.”
Hina came back over to us, sitting immediately to my right. There was only enough space for her to get one leg under the table as she splayed out a little bit. “Proper nouns, Alice. Also, no, I’m not touching him, see?”
“I can see. Good job. Uh—proper nouns, yes, right. Tochou is the big government building downtown, the one for the whole city rather than the individual wards. The Ministry is who we answer to, technically.”
I was, tragically, not the type to take notes on this sort of thing. In hindsight, I probably should have, but I had faith in Opal’s general put-togetherness.
“What are we actually doing there?”
“Honestly, mostly just getting the ball rolling on immigration and Register paperwork—that’s the National Flamebearer Register. We’ll have to do some bureaucracy back-and-forth for…well, our people said probably the next week, before we can officially make you a Todai employee. It won’t be hard on your end, just signing stuff. If we have time, I’d also like to take you up to the skydeck up there.”
“Hey! I wanted to do that!”
“…You hate going to Tochou.”
“Well, it would have been Skytree, probably. But I had a whole list of must-see stuff I wanted to take him to, and today’s perfect! Next weekend will be the fucking Hikanome thing, so we won’t get the chance to give him the tourist experience before—”
“Hina.”
“—whatever Peacie pencil-pusher shows up to plead his case with the Ministry or the Bureau because then we’ll get into a whole custody battle and—”
“Hina.” This time, Opal’s eyes flashed. “I’m not letting you drag him around Tokyo—before his foot is better.”
“I heard that pause. And his foot is better!” Hina pointed triumphantly at Ai’s sleeping form. “We did the stabilizer! Please, Alice. We’ll even be productive, get him a Suica and show him how to use it and he really needs some clothes and it’ll be fun and…”
She trailed off, making puppy eyes at Opal, whose expression had adopted a certain well-worn weariness as she pinched the bridge of her nose. I raised my hand tentatively.
“Um. Custody battle? The PCTF doesn’t go after flamebearers who are associated with another group.”
The Spire would give them hell for it—and I was indeed becoming rather attached to Todai, in more ways than one. Hina poked my shoulder.
“Naive. You’re a catch, cutie, they’re not going to let you go that easily. It should be today, Alice, and I’m free. You have your thing at one, Ai’s going to be asleep until sundown, Yuuka’s not even in the country, and Amane’s sick.”
Opal looked between us and flicked something at Hina from across the table, who recoiled with a yip.
“He doesn’t need the ‘tourist experience’. He’ll see plenty of Tokyo as we run errands anyway.”
“Not the fun parts! And he does need clothes, unless you’re going to keep lending him your old shirts and skirts until you can fit him into your schedule.”
I was getting just a little tired of being talked about like I wasn’t there, but all I really mustered was a mutter. “I’m not wearing a skirt. You said no dress-up.”
“Necessity, not dress-up. It’ll be skirts by tomorrow if we don’t buy you some clothes. I don’t think any of us own pants that fit you.”
Alice’s expression at last deepened into a proper frown, just a smidge stormy. “What do you mean she said?”
Hina blinked at me with those big, blue eyes. Of all the times for her to be in prompt-mode—
“Last night, we, uh…made plans for today.”
I flushed with embarrassment, both from the mortifying ordeal of having my intentions known in a general sense and from nerves about the confrontation that was surely about to erupt. Opal’s tail did a little slithering motion behind her, and she radiated heat for a moment, slitted eyes aglow—then dimmed, settling down.
“You don’t have to go out with her for her to pick up some clothes for you, if that’s your main concern. I could even just send somebody to do it, and she doesn’t have to be part of the process at all.”
“Alice…”
“You’re buying him pants so you can get in them later. Am I wrong?”
“That’s—I’m trying to be helpful. Do you want me to meet with the merch team instead so you can go shopping with him?”
“God, no.” She sighed. “You know what—fine. Hina. You are not to touch him. Don’t give me more headaches today with your feral—”
“Yeah, I know, Ebi already threatened me with you if I hurt him. He’s in good hands, Alice, I promise. You can hand him off to me after you’re done at Tochou, it’s no biggie. Here, just for your benefit—” She turned to me, an uncharacteristically serious look on her face. “Ezzen, I promise I will respect your physical and emotional well-being for the duration of our outing. No unwanted physical contact, no barging into your changing room, no dragging you into a love hotel for a quickie.”
I blinked. What? Opal took a long sip of her coffee. Hina leaned in toward her; her tail would have been wagging if she had one. Opal’s more literal tail had gone still.
“Good start, but as long as we’re doing things for my peace of mind: Ezzen. I still do not think this is a good idea, vis-a-vis your foot. I understand she didn’t exactly, er, give you the opportunity to approach the topic with a level head last night. Are you sure?”
Hina pouted. “Yeah, have this conversation right in front of me, why don’t you.”
Who was she to talk? They had had half of this conversation as though I wasn’t here, not that I had quite the fortitude—or callousness—to return the favor. I was barely managing to stop myself from being sucked into Hina’s eyes as it was.
“I’m…”
“Aw, cutie, don’tcha—”
“You, shut up. Let him think.”
“Aw. Fine!”
This was my opportunity to back out, with Opal’s full knowledge of the situation and without the reason-fogging cocktail of fear and desire of last night…Okay, no, I had to come clean, if only to myself. I still wanted Hina. I wanted her to call me “cutie” more and feel her against me and I couldn’t stop thinking about the last thing, the part about love hotels. If I asked, would she—
I peeled my thoughts away from that sticky, sweaty possibility with the help of the one additional stipulation we had decided last night, right before things had turned steamy. Well, that sort of undercut what I was about to say, but I still stood by it. I had to.
“…We agreed it wasn’t a date. I’ll—hold you to that.”
Opal seemed…‘skeptical’ was a word, but so was ‘out of fucks to give’. Well, that was five words, but the point is that the fight left her.
“You know what? Good enough. At least we don’t have to worry about her mantling up like Yuuka.”
“Yep! I hate the attention, so out there I’m, uh…Hinata Suzuha, normal human. Who’s Radiance Sapphire? I’ve only seen the first four seasons of Precure! What even is ripple propagation?”
“Don’t start with that again.”
And that was that. Opal apparently did trust Hina to her word. Was she right to trust mine? I didn’t know. She made the plan official with some click-clack on her keyboard.
“Alright, it’s in the calendar. Wait, did I not share that with you yesterday? Hold on.”
She sent me a link, and lo, there it was, slotted between Alice+Ezzen Paperwork (10AM-12PM) and Group Call w/ Yuuka (7PM-8PM):
Hina+Ezzen Shopping (NOT A DATE!) (12PM-5PM).
I appreciated the clarification, though Hina’s apparent disregard—disdain, perhaps—for calendars made me doubt that it would meaningfully limit her behavior. Some tension left my body as the conversation de-escalated and we returned to eating. Well, actually, just Opal. I still had half a pancake to go, but my appetite had been murdered by dark thoughts earlier and then buried by the argument, and Hina had—not eaten anything this whole time? She didn’t even have a plate. I frowned, offering her my scraps hesitantly.
“Did you eat before we came down?”
“Oh, I don’t—wow, I guess it hasn’t come up yet, huh. I don’t eat much. Or sleep much. Perks of my body. And you can have that too, cutie, if you just—whoa—”
Suddenly, she was leaning on me, already making another attraction-based assault on my moral compass, presenting another temptation to become more and reject the limitations of my flesh, to become more like her though indulging mutual pain to feed my Flame—
Something clanged against the metal railing of the stairs, and I flinched, twisting just in time to see Opal’s fork ricochet into the floor, penetrating the hardwood prongs-first. It was a little mutilated by the journey. I needed a moment to unravel exactly what had occurred. My thoughts had spiraled to the wrong conclusion shockingly quickly. Wishful thinking? In reality, Hina hadn’t been tempting me with her body—well, maybe she had, but the lean had just been her dodging the wrathful projectile. I turned back to Opal—who had vanished from her seat. A draconic growl came from right behind us as a well-manicured hand peeled Hina off of me. I shivered.
“Ezzen, this is an object lesson. Hina is scary as shit, yeah?”
“Y—yeah?”
“She’s not the only one. I’ve got your back. If she breaks her word, or makes you uncomfortable in any way, you tell me. I’m serious; text me and I’ll come pick you up and throw her in the bay.”
Author’s Note:
Oh no, Ez, you’d have to wear skirts. This outcome must be avoided at all costs. Right?
Thanks to the beta readers: Cassiopeia, Softies, Zak, Maria. I feel like I say it every week, but this chapter got a lot stronger with their feedback.
Join the Discord to discuss the story and hang out with other Sunspot readers!
Join the Patreon to support the story and read chapters three weeks ahead of public!
I was attracted to her, intensely, primally, more powerfully than anything else I had ever felt for anyone. That didn’t excuse…whatever that had been. For one, it was probably sexual assault of some sort—but what authority could contain her, short of her teammates? If I had tried harder to stonewall her, would we have wound up here anyway? I was well and truly helpless against her, it seemed. That was an upsetting thought, doubly so for the way it continued to thrill me.
Okay, no, no—I tried to back off from those thoughts. What had she actually offered, magically speaking? She promised some kind of change, a metamorphosis via close contact with her Flame. Close contact…her hips over mine, her lips against mine. That had been my first kiss, and second, and third, and it had been so good—
“Fucking hell.”
I sat up and shook myself, rubbing my face, trying to get her out of my head. I couldn’t. I pulled out my phone to distract myself, flopping over onto my side and opening up the chatroom—but I could barely focus on the little glass-and-plastic rectangle; compared to her, it felt so fake, so distant. She was real and potent and intoxicating, everything I wanted without understanding why, so much more than anything I had experienced before. That was white ripple, it had to be, because the way she was impossibly high-resolution and vivid in my head couldn’t just be the raw attraction—but try as I might, I couldn’t deny even a little of the want. The…craving? Whatever she had done to me, I wanted more of it. Oh no.
I tossed down the phone and tried to re-center in another way. She had interrupted my attempt to organize the contents of my backpack. I got back to work: the knife got re-wrapped in the towel and went back inside the bag for now, the snack bars went on the nightstand next to the moisturizer she had offered to replace—
The thoughts crept in anyway. This was stupid; I was stupid. Why was I even here? Because she wanted me here. Why did she want me here? It almost didn’t matter—even though it most certainly did. She was just so hot—had been completely willing to pin me against the sheets and keep ravaging me, and I had said…had I even said no?
I hefted the backpack and put it on the floor next to my bed. In the end, I had told her to leave…a frustratingly loud part of me, the part she had dragged up from wherever it was buried and stoked until it was ablaze with desire, was still rebuking myself for that. And I hated that I wanted her.
I hated a lot of this, actually. Everything had changed in a single great ripple of fate. Why the hell had I wanted this? I had lost—well, not everything, but every routine and familiar fixture of my old life, replaced by danger and pain and always being around people who wanted things from me. I tried to figure out why that upset me so much, flopping down onto the now-cleared bedspread.
I was a flamebearer now, someone who they said mattered, on the other side of the world with one of the most famous Vaetna-type groups short of the Spire itself, and it was all terrifying and different and I wanted to go home but this was my home now, this mostly empty room down the hall from magical fucking girls who wanted me to become one of them for some reason and—
It was too much. I didn’t sob, but tears escaped my eyes unbidden, rolling down my cheeks and onto the pillow as I stared up at the glaring white lights in the ceiling. Too bright—there was probably a dimmer switch, but I was too overwhelmed. Where did I go from here? How the hell was I supposed to navigate whatever fucked-up, abusive, wildly desirable arrangement I had apparently just entered with Hina? She’d promised to hurt me, and I’d indirectly promised to return the favor—was I actually going to follow through with that? I felt unmoored from the ideals that had so strongly anchored me earlier in the day, with Ai. Part of me wanted to sneak down to her lab and talk through what had just happened with her…it was better to cry with her than alone, maybe.
But I had only met Ai today too. I had been so thoroughly tossed into this new status quo that she was maybe the closest thing I had to a confidant who would ‘get it’. Would Star? Maybe—but I couldn’t bring myself to come clean with how ferally attracted to the fanged girl I found myself, not to somebody who didn’t know her personally, somebody who didn’t feel the danger she exuded. Regardless of how much these feelings had to be white ripple rather than some damnably innate, instinctual part of me—at a remove, Star wouldn’t get the dissonance.
But I couldn’t go talk to Ai for a simpler reason: I wasn’t about to prance through the building shirtless, displaying the lingering marks of Hina’s twisted affections. As I examined where she had bitten me, I knew those marks would linger. She had just destroyed the only shirt I owned, so there was no way for me to hide it, and if the others saw then surely they’d know immediately that it had been her doing. Would they take my side, take pity on me for the way she had all but forced herself on me? Perhaps at first, but if she revealed the full breadth of what I had agreed to explore with her?
Well—slow down, Dalton. She wasn’t a complete monster. She had admitted to her behavior at least partially being a test, and after that point she had been quite respectful of my boundaries and, frankly, adorable. To some extent, now that she had taken my first kiss—and second and third, I still wasn’t even a little over that—and made her pitch, I was closer to her than any of the others; that had pretty clearly been her goal, but she had also said she wasn’t going to monopolize me. That boded well for my overall safety around her, hopefully.
I tried to prioritize practical problems to escape the spiral of thoughts. Getting a new shirt would be a good start; deciding whether I’d go see Ai or just try to go to sleep or figure out other coping mechanisms could wait until after.
ezzen: I don’t suppose there’s spare clothes somewhere in my room?
ebi-furai: uh, nope
ebi-furai: i cant leave amethyst at the moment but opal can bring you something
ebi-furai: one sec
Opal probably wouldn’t tease me about the bites the way Ebi would, but this was still going to be embarrassing. I hastily shed the scraps of my old shirt—not one of any particular nostalgia, at least, just a black long-sleeve V-neck of which I had probably owned half a dozen duplicates, picked for inconspicuity when I had fled for the Gate. I hid it and my torso under the blanket to retain some dignity, peeking just my head out from the covers, hoping Opal would just drop the clothes and leave. At least it was nice and cozy against the winter chill, though the way my blood was still running high from the intimate encounter meant that was sort of moot.
Opal arrived a minute later. My door opened with a click, and padded footsteps came from the antechamber before she appeared at the gateway to my bedroom.
“How’s unpacking?”
She didn’t look any worse for wear since I had last seen her; she was probably mostly moral support when it came to taking care of Amethyst, compared to Ebi being seemingly a one-woman operating room. She had shed the jacket and so was now wearing only the sports bra and leggings, exposing toned midriff that my already riled-up libido didn’t need right now. I tried to keep my voice level.
“Not much to unpack. But my clothes have gotten a bit, er, gross, and I didn’t bring a change…”
I directed my attention instead to the large t-shirt she was carrying on a coat hanger, along with what looked like shorts. She came over and offered me the shirt first. I extended my non-bitten arm out from my nest of blanket and took it from her. It was clearly meant to be an oversize fit, which was good. It had a graphic on it depicting Sailor Moon in streetwear, which was less good, but acceptable. There were more embarrassing things to wear.
“No worries. This is the biggest shirt I could find in our closet. It might be a bit big even on you, but it should be enough for tonight. Want me to wash the old one?”
“Uh—” Shit. I couldn’t just say ‘no’ to that, but I didn’t have an excuse queued up either. Well…nothing for it. I dug out the ruined scraps of fabric, avoiding her eyes. Surely, she’d understand what had happened here, that I hadn’t signed up for this?
“Hina.”
She froze. “Ah. I’m, er—oh no. Are you alright?”
I really didn’t know. Maybe? There was genuine worry on her face—I tried to allay her fears.
“I’m fine. She, um, gave me a bit of a fright, but she left when I told her to.”
Technically not a lie, in the sense that she had indeed told me to tell her to leave right at the end…of course, she had ignored me telling her to leave the first time. Had that solely been part of the test? Opal’s expression twisted in a few ways before she settled on—guilt? Her lips were pursed. Wordlessly, she offered me the shorts. These were also supposed to be oversized, relative to whichever shorter woman owned them, but looked to fit me decently. It wasn’t exactly winter wear, but it’d be good enough for tonight. Then she sighed, casting her gaze over to the window.
“She’s been such a problem this whole time. I’m glad she saved you, but…I’m so sorry you had to put up with her. I’ll give her a talking-to.” She turned back to me, and her voice got a little more lifeless, like she really didn’t want to say what came out of her mouth next. “Did she really leave when you asked?”
Her eyes weren’t as striking as Hina’s. They were still undeniably beautiful in their strange, black-and-orange color scheme and slitted pupils, just not as transfixing as the impossible blue of her teammate’s gaze. Yet she still saw through me, or maybe through her teammate, with me as the conduit. I hunched up a bit, then slowly lowered the blanket past my shoulders.
Opal growled when she saw the bite marks. Her tail thrashed, and the air around her shimmered as a pulse of heat emanated off of her.
“God damn it.” She shut her eyes, stilled her tail, and took a deep breath. “Sorry. That’s not directed at you.”
It felt almost unfaithful to expose more skin in front of her when she was already not leaving much to the imagination on her upper half herself. I had the ridiculous, reflexive sense that this somehow qualified as cheating on Hina, which was so absolutely wrong regarding my relationship with both Radiances. I most certainly didn’t want to think of Opal that way—I shrugged on the shirt anyway. Weird impulses about relationships notwithstanding, it was still definitely over-exposing myself to someone who might technically be my boss starting tomorrow.
“I get it. She’s—a lot. And we did…” I wasn’t going to admit how much of the encounter had been a masochistic make-out session. “We talked. She wants to help my Flame change me. With pain. Not very ‘magical girl’, is it?”
The dragon-girl frowned; apparently, my tone hadn’t been joking enough.
“It’s—no, it’s not even a little mahou shoujo. She’s always been our little monster, but I was hoping…bugger. I wish I didn’t have to apologize to you about her every ten seconds.” She rubbed her temple. “She’ll…I told you she’d respect boundaries, but I should have done more to help with that. I’m sorry.”
I felt sort of bad about how upset she was getting—and was also unfairly and unreasonably peeved that she was more concerned with my safety and her teammate’s character than the implications about magic.
“It’s fine. I’m fine, really, uh—” I had to reach to remember her actual name. “Alice. These—” I gestured at the bite marks, “—are no big deal compared to my foot, and we really did, er, come to an understanding. I’m not so much worried about her as, um—wondering whether her way…works?”
That was a lie on multiple levels. I was not fine, the bites very much were a big deal, and I had her so embedded in my brain that I couldn’t even think about the magical aspects she had implied—that last one was an unwelcome first for me.
“It does, but—you see what she’s like. It’s an ugly, awful way of doing things, and being changed by your magic isn’t always a good thing.” She sighed. “If you say you’re fine—I…I believe you, but I need to impress on you the importance of boundaries with her. She’s dangerous and clingy. You’ll wake up with her in your bed, or worse, unless you tell her that’s not allowed. I’ll tell her to treat you with the same rules she has with us.”
According to the part of my brain that kept replaying the feeling of her lips against mine, waking up to a Hina snuggled up to me sounded absolutely fantastic, damn what my reason or prey instincts said.
“What kind of rules?”
She counted off on her fingers. Curiously, she started at her thumb.
“No entering our rooms without permission. No physical contact outside of sparring without permission. No wearing our dirty laundry. No…‘gifts’. You have to tell her these things directly, or she’ll just keep doing them.”
I frowned. “She’s not an animal.” At least, that’s what I had resolved when I was face-to-face with her, but Opal seemed to think otherwise. The way she had said “gifts” made me loath to ask for details. “…Is she?”
“I shouldn’t have called her a monster. But she is dangerous, and doesn’t think all that much like a human. Any other rules you want?”
And that was the question, wasn’t it? What boundaries did I want to set with Hina?
“I…don’t know? If you think that’s enough…”
“It will be.”
“Okay.”
For now, I’d trust Opal’s judgment. We looked at each other for a moment, unsure where to go with the conversation. She coughed.
“Amane is doing alright. She might have a rough night, but she’ll be good by tomorrow afternoon, hopefully.”
“Um—good.” I didn’t want to ask more about her condition. “Oh. Er—Hina said I’d be able to walk tomorrow?”
“Oh. I knew I had forgotten to mention something earlier!” She thumped the tip of her tail against the floor and looked a bit sheepish at having forgotten. “Ai and Hina are collaborating on a stabilizer for your foot, enough for you to at least walk around for a few hours for errands.”
They could do that? “That’s—can I see the diagram?” It’d probably be {NULL-COMPOSE} with a blue link, maybe an {AFFIX} somewhere in there.
She smiled at that. “Tomorrow, sure. There’s so much I’d like to talk to you about when it comes to magic, but…one thing at a time, you understand.”
I sat up a bit more. “I, um. Now would be alright.” There was a lot I wanted to ask her, both about the technical details of the stabilizer and other specifics of the brand of glyphcraft the Radiances wielded. It could also be a distraction from pondering what Hina had hinted about the Vaetna and magic as a whole.
She waved me off. “Let’s stick with the schedule. You should really get some sleep to start adjusting to the time difference.”
I almost pouted. She was right, but—glyphcraft! She saw me struggling to not object. “Ah, fine, let me at least throw you a bone. There’s a {DISTORT} in there.”
Huh? No, there couldn’t be—but Todai did have the infrastructure to make third-order substrate. And if Hina was indeed most like the Vaetna—would she be the one to weave it? That made sense with her threat to withhold it from me, if she was the only one able to actually twist the Flame through the fourth dimension, substrate or not. That must have been where her leverage was coming from. Lesson one, her husky voice rang in my head. I suppressed a shiver.
“Thanks for the hint.”
“No problem. Need anything else?”
I looked around the barren room even as my mind raced around potential constructions involving the advanced glyph. “I, er, right now? Not really, I don’t think…”
Longer term, of course I’d like a PC setup for that desk and ideally some Spire merch to make it feel a bit more like home, but I really wanted to just be done with my day right now. Opal scanned the room as well.
“Do you have a water bottle?”
“Er—no? There are cups in the bathroom, I think?”
“Yeah, but you don’t want to wake up parched and then have to hobble across the room in the dark. Amane still tries to do it sometimes and has had a few spills.”
Oh, right. My damn crippled foot. “Ah. Then—yes, please?” It felt wrong to ask a high-profile VNT to fetch mundane conveniences for me, but Opal seemed entirely used to this as a result of living with Amethyst. She went off to retrieve a vessel. As she returned, she called over from the doorway.
“Oh, you left these over here.”
She reappeared with a metal water bottle in one hand and carrying my crutches in the other. I had left them by the door, out of sight, as a sort of denial of their presence.
“Not a fan?”
“I—will the stabilizer mean I don’t need them?”
“Sadly, no. You still don’t want to be using the foot constantly, so…I’d have to check with Ebi. We’ll talk about it tomorrow, yeah?”
“Right. Er—thanks.”
Silence reigned once more. Opal sort of looked like she had something she wanted to say, fidgeting a bit.
“What?”
She sighed.
“Amethyst had…a very hard time adjusting to her disabilities, at first. She’s not good at accepting help. So I know what you’re going through. You shouldn’t have to deal with Hina on top of your recovery—if you feel unsafe sleeping so close to her, um, we can move you back to the medical wing like we discussed, or maybe even set you up in a hotel for tonight if Ebi gives the okay—”
I frowned. She was offering me a sort of escape, an option to not dive face-first into all of this. I could even…if none of the Radiances themselves were there to keep an eye on me, I could even flee to the Gate, maybe. I could renege on my agreement to join Todai and abandon this exceptionally weird day, go to the Spire, where I belonged. Did I belong there? The idea that their magic was rooted in suffering still loomed too large to confront directly—if that were the case…
Even aside from that—did I feel the need to put distance between myself and Hina? Incredibly, no. As much as she rightfully frightened me, I craved more of her. And I wanted to learn more about Ebi, compare notes with Ai and Amane. I had managed to accumulate a fair number of reasons to stay where I was. I looked again at the still-mostly-barren room around us, the bookshelf devoid of anything but four slim notebooks. This wasn’t home—but it could be, once I made it my own with a real computer and familiar iconography of magic.
“I’m alright.”
“You’re sure?”
“I’m—yeah, I’m sure. If you can just keep her out of my room tonight…”
“Absolutely. I’ll make clear to her that you’re off limits. She’ll probably be down with Ai for most of tonight anyway.” She turned back toward the archway. “Try to get some sleep. Even a little will help.”
“I’ll…try. Good night. And, um—thank you. For all of this.”
She smiled. “It’s the mahou shoujo thing to do. Good night.”
As I saw her disappear around the corner and heard the door click, I pondered how she had described what she was going to say to Hina. Off limits, huh. I rather wanted to be on Hina’s limits, terrifying as it was—I was running out of energy to continue the internal struggle anyway. It was a tomorrow problem. At least I wouldn’t have to go through tomorrow morning with everybody knowing how she had…claimed me. The bites throbbed in a constant low-level reminder of the act. It shouldn’t have been as hot as it was.
As for the last thing Opal had said—what was mahou shoujo? I knew the literal meaning, but the actual…moral contents? Her worldview? I didn’t know, and my flagging energy needed to be rationed for some housekeeping on the forums instead of further speculation and worrying about the Radiances. I rolled over to retrieve my laptop from the nightstand, adjusting my pillow to lean back against the headboard. My foot protested the shift a bit, but my physical state was definitely better than it had been with Hina on top of me. My hands weren’t shaking anymore, at least.
First, I looked at the top few posts. There was indeed one about me, or rather the ‘Bristol Flamefall’ and subsequent three-way almost-clash between the PCTF, Todai, and the Spire. This one actually had footage of the moment I buried the car, although taken from far enough away that my features couldn’t be made out other than the fact that I was white.
They had blocked off traffic from our side of the motorway, and the flow of cars in the opposite direction had slowed to a crawl as rubberneckers gawked at the paramilitary action so close to home. In grainy 480p, I saw the armored Peacie officer step backward on reflex as the car was exchanged with the dirt copy, then turn back to the modified SUV to consult with whoever was coordinating the operation. Presumably, that was the moment they had called in the gunship, since everybody just sort of waited where they were—they rightfully figured they had me.
As things turned out, they didn’t. After a tense minute of waiting—during which I had been busy discovering awful truths about the Flame and subsequently passing out down there in the dark—something bright-blue lanced down from the sky, and Radiance Sapphire complicated the affair. The person taking the recording breathed an oath as the shockwave buffeted them, shaking the camera.
Unfortunately, that was the moment the PCTF gunship showed up and killed every recording device within a kilometer of the incident, according to other posts referencing eyewitness accounts. That was standard operating procedure, the equivalent of turning off the bodycam. It was one of the most incriminating things the PCTF did, and was the main reason that hard evidence of the darker rumors was hard to find. At least now I knew for sure that Hina had indeed gotten there first, before the Vaetna had—I really ought to apologize to Sky. If Hina had arrived at pretty much the same time as the gunship, before the Vaetna…things had been ugly enough that I couldn’t really blame her for just getting me the hell out, her personal motives notwithstanding.
[Direct Message] ezzen: Hey Sky, I’m sorry for blowing up at you earlier. I just watched the video of how things went down, and as far as I’m concerned, you and Sapphire did what you had to. Thanks for the save.
ezzen: I owe you my life, I think? And it was stupid and petty of me to get so mad. Todai has been good to me so far. If Star or Moth are giving you shit over it, tell them I’ve forgiven you, because I have.
ezzen: Um, also
ezzen: It’s totally fair if you can’t give me a straight answer on this, but I was wondering how exactly you know Sapphire? I know you’ve alluded to having talked to a few VNTs, but she doesn’t quite strike me as the type, if that makes sense.
ezzen: Thanks and sorry again. Going to bed now, so we might miss each other a bit.
He didn’t respond—probably busy, or maybe asleep. He kept weird hours, and we weren’t actually sure where he even lived.
Back to the forums: I saved the link to that post and others like it, then went looking for information on the flamefalls that had immediately followed. Nothing but the usual PCTF boilerplate on the one in America, and Kat had dispatched the inferno in Poland without incident or fatalities, other than the poor sap who had been flametouched. Previously, that had been an abstract sort of mourning for a life taken unfairly but by necessity—now it chilled me to think that could have been me.
The Gulf of Mexico situation remained a standoff; just because it hadn’t gone inferno yet didn’t necessarily mean it wouldn’t, and nobody would be comfortable until the bearer in question was off that rig, but neither side was willing to back down. Very political, sort of silly, if not for the threat of disaster. Heliotrope was out there too, somewhere. For a moment I wondered about the logistics of that. She had presumably taken her jetbike—but she couldn’t exactly sleep on it out over the water for multiple days in a row, could she? Had she gotten a hotel? The strange mundanity of that was something I would have never considered for VNTs like the Radiances before today. Sure, Hina was something more than human, and Opal was also changed by her Flame in whatever chilling process that entailed, but Ai and Amane were decidedly mortal, and Heliotrope, from what I knew, was presumably in the same bucket as them.
Now for a post of my own; it was high time I gave at least a brief update that I was okay. It was all in my usual, clinical voice I used for the forums, giving me the chance to emotionally detach from everything that had happened to me and look at the day as a whole. I confirmed that I was the Bristol Flametouched and expressed a lot of gratitude toward the well-wishers. I detailed what had happened to my foot, remarking that I had become a case study in blood-price misestimation. I teased that my research was about to kick into a whole new gear now that I could test glyphs hands-on, trying to emanate positivity rather than trepidation.
I considered how much I could say beyond that. I was essentially certain that at least the Spire and PCTF already knew I was at Todai from having seen Hina carry me off, though probably not that I was with them—which apparently I was. With that in mind, confirming that I was indeed being taken care of by Todai didn’t really put me in the crosshairs any more than I already was. I further mentioned that they had graciously offered to provide me with a prosthetic foot to replace the one I had lost; it couldn’t hurt to be effusive, and my gratitude was genuine besides. Lastly, I hinted at the possibility that, regardless of what the future held, I’d at least get the chance to talk shop with them and hopefully generate at least one interesting paper on the topic.
I went back through the post, rereading it, making sure I didn’t miss anything obvious. It looked good, so I hit post and dropped the link in the chatroom.
ezzen: Behold, the official story so far.
ezzen: Will take a look at replies etc in the morning. Gn
With some effort, I made myself close the laptop and return it to the nightstand next to the water bottle. It wouldn’t do to stay up until midnight when I was trying to reset my sleep, even though I wasn’t feeling tired yet.
Unfortunately, I had to get out of bed to kill the lights. I looked at the crutches—the switch was just across the room. I sighed and extricated myself from the blanket, swinging my legs over the bed’s edge, good foot first. The prosthetic made contact with the hardwood floor with a soft tap, and I reflected that I should get some rugs. By now, I knew better than to try to stand straight up; I leaned on the bedpost for support before shifting my hand to the wall to limp around the perimeter of the room, foot stinging all the while even with the minimal force I was putting on it. It was still better for my self-image than needing the crutches just to turn off the lights. Perhaps without the analgomancy I’d have felt differently.
I made it to the switch and hit it with a certain amount of triumph as the room was plunged into darkness. Or—relative darkness. Since one entire wall of the room was glass, the city lights still faintly illuminated the interior, bright enough that it would interfere with my sleep. I hastily turned the lights back on to inspect the panel—yep, there was also a knob which, upon experimentation, controlled the dimming on the windows. Turning them to full opacity was the best for darkness and helped me not think about how high off the ground I was. Satisfied, I killed the lights again and waited a minute for my eyes to adjust more, wary of what Opal had said about traversing in the dark. Then I reversed my journey; a little more difficult this time around as I leaned on my left arm, somewhat off-balance with my right foot held off the ground. It was easier once I returned to the safety of my bed, where I could crawl in relative comfort.
As I made myself comfortable, the pain and pressures of trying to walk faded, and I became aware of an itch in my stump. Should I take off the prosthetic? It was just attached with an {AFFIX}, and it would be trivial enough to disengage the glyph—but I’d also lose whatever analgomancy was muting the pain. Were there still regular painkillers in my system? I fumbled for my phone.
ezzen: My foot itches, can I take off the prosthetic?
ebi-furai: hmm
ebi-furai: well the itching is normal, thats the painkillers
ebi-furai: so it’d hurt more once you take it off
ebi-furai: one sec
She returned after maybe twenty seconds.
ebi-furai: ai thinks you should take it off and see how the pain is
ebi-furai: if its bad we can give you something
ezzen: Okay
I put down the phone and brought my leg in to grope at the connection point between the stump and the prosthetic. I squeezed my eyes shut, trying to feel the weave with my nascent magical senses and map that to what my hand was feeling. There was something sort of…sticky. It took me a moment to figure out that that wasn’t a physical sensation—it was how my mind was interpreting the {AFFIX}. Coming off of it was something fuzzy, which must be the chain providing the painkiller effect. I sucked in a breath and deactivated the prosthetic.
A spike of pain lanced up from my toes—or where my toes had used to be—making my stomach clench as I gripped my ankle.
“Fuck.”
It settled into more of a dull ache after a moment—but tolerable, and at least the itch was gone.
ezzen: It’s manageable. Maybe a 3?
ebi-furai: then keep it off. you should clean it tomorrow. you know how to take care of burns
It wasn’t really a question; my right hand indicated my medical history regardless of whether or not she had scrounged up my records. I dumped the prosthetic on the floor next to the nightstand—a little too irreverently, perhaps, given my gratitude toward Ai. I leaned down to at least set the false foot upright.
ezzen: Yep.
ebi-furai: then thats all ive got for tonight
ebi-furai: ping me if you cant sleep, i can slip out long enough to give you something once amane is asleep
ezzen: Thanks. Gn
ebi-furai: oyasumi
For the next hour, I kept shifting under the blanket, trying in vain to find a position which would reduce the ache in my stump. Watching familiar videos about the Vaetna helped take my mind off of it somewhat, but in turn brought up lingering anxieties about their nature. In turn, that got me thinking about Hina and the insane, intoxicating high she inspired in me, even now that I had some remove from the weight of her hips atop mine or her teeth in my shoulder. It’s crass to say I was too horny to sleep, but it took me a long time to wind down enough for slumber to take me.
—
That night, I was woken twice.
First, by the sound of arguing, in what sounded like English, though I couldn’t make out the words. They were in the hall—possibly even right outside my door. A jolt of excitement ran through me as I rolled over blearily; had Opal caught Hina attempting to sneak in? Opal sounded furious, barking reprimand after reprimand. I could practically see the withering glare, although it was just as easy to imagine Hina unrepentant, blinking innocently with those blue eyes. At least they didn’t start brawling, this time, as the voices retreated down the hall. Half-awake, I was disappointed that she wouldn’t come cuddle with me. I shifted under the blanket and returned to comfortable oblivion before the pain had a chance to drag me further into consciousness.
The second was when something shook the entire building. I panicked and didn’t know what to do other than huddle under the blanket until it subsided. I assumed it was an earthquake. It wasn’t severe enough to knock anything over, but the water bottle rattled in place. It probably only lasted fifteen or twenty seconds, but it felt longer there in the dark. As it subsided, I sipped from the bottle as I tried to calm down and groped for my phone. I found the website for earthquake information, squinting with some consternation at the only source of light shining directly into my eyes, inches from my face. There was nothing of sufficient magnitude and nearness—earlier this evening there had been a minor quake on one of the other islands, but either the site hadn’t been updated yet…or what I had just felt hadn’t been an earthquake.
After a few minutes of failing to get back to sleep, I returned to my phone out of habit, checking the replies to my post. I was greeted by an atmosphere of relief and celebration, as well as some anticipation. Many of them were asking whether I was safe long-term, what I’d do next—whether I was headed to the Spire or not. That would make sense, wouldn’t it? Why wouldn’t I go?
Well, because Todai had gotten to me first and given me lots of reasons to stick around…and because I now had just the tiniest crumb of doubt in the Vaetna. Not that I could say these things on the forum. I squinted into the phone’s light and spat out some short replies. I was here at least until my foot was better; I had been making for the Spire before Todai had intervened and I was grateful to them for that; I’d give regular updates about how learning magic went—nothing important, obvious stuff.
I did eventually put away my phone for good. My foot still hurt, but it wasn’t enough to warrant bothering Ebi about. When I got to sleep for the third and final time, in that bed in my new home, down half of a foot, up a spear in my arm and a chunk of the Frozen Flame on my soul—
I dreamed.
—
I stand on the ice. Now there is a crack, and my blood has seeped through. I step backwards from the fracture, although the ice is surely too thick for my weight to matter. I turn, to retreat to the safety of the shore, but it is gone, and I am surrounded in all directions by the ice. I look down at it.
“Are you my Flame? Or all of it?”
“Both.”
Hina stands in front of me, kicking at the crack idly. She is beautiful and deadly and alluring and here there is no fear. She looks up at the sunless sky, sighing.
“But this is just a dream.”
I’m not surprised by this.
“Even you?”
“Mhm. You thought you’d get sweet dream-sex with the real Hina after just one night? At least take her to dinner first.”
She’s right; that’s entirely too much to ask. I point at the crack, at the lights below in the water. Even here, especially here, magic is of greater importance to me.
“Why am I up here when they’re down there?”
She hums, husky, almost a purr.
“Because you’ve been at a remove. You only know the theory, and you think that makes you better than the ones who have lived with it. You think you can weasel out of pain. Well—”
She stomps, and the cracks shoot out in all directions, to the horizon, a spiderweb augury. The ice begins to crumble beneath me.
“Prove it.”
I fall into the water, and her laughter chases me down into the darkness.
Author’s Note:
As usual, thanks to the beta readers: Softies, Cassiopeia, Zak, and Maria.
Join the Discord to discuss the story and hang out with other Sunspot readers!
Join the Patreon to support the story and read chapters three weeks ahead of public!
Ebi pulled me to my feet, or rather just my foot, hesitant as I was to put weight on the prosthetic yet. The wheelchair was comfortable and motorized, but I hated being at waist-level from both a practical and emotional standpoint; it was hardly an upgrade to being carted around on the bed. In some ways, it was worse, since the bed at least carried an assumption that it was temporary, whereas the wheelchair felt much more long-term, even if that wasn’t necessarily the case. The crutches let me pretend at some independence and mobility.
We had retired to the plush and somewhat-scattered sitting area in the penthouse’s main space. Amethyst had re-mantled with a fizz-pop and some minor ripple that left my throat dry and was sitting rather prim and proper—Ebi had helpfully informed me it was called seiza, legs folded under her—upon the largest pillow I had ever seen. Opal sat next to her at the low table, a laptop before her, trying to schedule me into their life. She typed idly as Ebi helped me fit the crutches to my height.
“One of us should take you to Tochou tomorrow. You didn’t come into the country through…normal means, so we have to do some immigration paperwork and get the ball rolling on registering you with the Bureau. We can hit some other day-one things—showing you how to use the subway, things like that. I’d also—well, how does that sound? Do you feel up to it?”
Part of me just wanted to huddle in my room, having had more than enough adventures for a while. But it was easy to imagine how that documentation was relatively urgent. Satisfied with my balance, I dismounted the crutches, and Ebi helped me back to a sitting position across from them at the table.
“I think so? If it’s just paperwork.”
“We’ll try to keep it short, yeah. Tokyo is a city that sort of demands a lot of walking, and I don’t want to drag you all over until your foot has had a bit longer to heal. How’s it looking, Ebi?”
“Healing well. Doesn’t need more intervention for a few more days, as long as you don’t put too much pressure on it.”
“Good, good. Schedule is a bit…tight—I have a thing with the merch people at one—but I could definitely take you in the morning.” She typed into the laptop to alter the schedule before lowering the screen to look at me. The tip of her tail waved lazily, probably involuntarily.
“I don’t want to overload you with things to do right now, so we’ll figure out the rest as we go. The only other thing is—oh.” She pulled out her phone. “Contact info.”
That—well, that just made sense, didn’t it? I took out my own phone, glancing at Amethyst, wondering whether she’d participate in this little social ritual. The mecha-ness of her mantle teased at the idea that maybe she had some kind of readout or internet connection and didn’t need a separate device—but she just produced a phone from pocketspace, catching it with her surprisingly dextrous, flowing fingers. It had a purple case to match her gemstone form and was thoroughly sticker bombed with hearts and other icons. Opal’s was decorated with more restraint: her team’s symbol in a shiny holographic blue, shimmering like my tattoo did, adorning an otherwise-white case. They had their aesthetics all figured out. By contrast, my phone had a simple black case, inconspicuous as could be. Ebi looked at it.
“We should get him a Japanese SIM card. Actually, a whole new phone, maybe. What’s that from, 2016?”
It was, in fact. It was my fifteenth birthday present, and I’d never really had the cash or interest to get a better one. Opal peered at it as well.
“Oh, I didn’t even…you’re right. And then the phone number will change, so…Ezzen, what do you have attached to that phone number? A bank account? Anything else?”
I was still getting used to being called by that name.
“Yeah, but there’s not much in it. It’s, um…I guess mostly two-factor authentication.”
That’d be a pain to switch over across all my various accounts online, especially considering that I no longer had my PC as my fallback device. Getting locked out of the forums wasn’t a concern because I could just ask Sky—well, once we made up—but it could still be a real headache on other sites. I used a central Google email for many of my accounts, and losing access to that by accident would be a major headache.
Amethyst asked Opal something, who thought for a moment, replied, and then turned back to me. “Amane’s pointing out that your LINE account would also be tied to your phone number, so we should wait for that until after we get you a new phone. Still—”
She showed me her phone number, and I dutifully copied it down. Different format than what I was used to; Tokyo numbers seemed to go 03-XXXX-XXXX. I made new contact entries. Name: Alice Takehara, number type: mobile, workplace: Todai. What a strange version of reality I found myself in. I then had to perform the always slightly embarrassing task of confirming the number was correct with an initial message.
Dalton: Test.
Alice: Hello
I did the same with Amane.
Dalton: Test.
Amane: よろしくね
With rudimentary contact info shared—I was already in contact with Ebi via the chatroom—Opal decisively closed her laptop all the way with both hands, a soft whump.
“I’m not touching any more work tonight. It’s a holiday. Let’s show you to your room and get you set up.”
Back onto the crutches. The Radiances took the stairs, but it was back to the elevator for me and Ebi; there was just one flight, but braving the stairs with the crutches was…just no. When we disembarked, I was a little surprised that the door that opened was the opposite one from which we had entered—it was obvious why as I reoriented myself. The balcony terminated at the elevator shaft, so coming out the way we had entered would have been something like a four-meter fall down to where we had first disembarked onto the 19th floor.
The second level was indeed where the Radiances’ individual rooms were. They were arranged in a U-shape around the perimeter of the space, about a dozen rooms in total. Maybe that was future-proofing for cases like mine; it was just too much space for this few people. The space in the center of the U, where the elevator spat us out, held a second large lounge area full of more beanbag chairs, low tables, and the like. The ceiling above held a projector, although it wasn’t obvious where the screen was.
The doors to each room were curious, because not every Radiance lived alone. Sapphire had her own room, furthest to the left of the U, clearly marked with a…clip-art of a sapphire printed onto a sheet of paper taped to the door. The next was a double door, marked with more professional-looking graphic posters of Opal and Amethyst. They lived together, it seemed, the entrance large enough to accommodate Amethyst’s size when mantled. I refrained from comment, but the way they had been holding hands—hmm. Well, good for them. Next was Emerald, who had a digital readout on her door confirming that she was currently in her lab in the basement. Last, Heliotrope, whose door had a big handwritten sign on it that I couldn’t read: 獣の方には立入禁止. Ebi said something to Opal, who bounced the observation to me.
“You can’t read that, I assume?”
“No.”
“In that case, short lesson. You’ll see that sign all over construction sites and train stations, so it’s a useful one to know. It says ‘keep out’. More literally ‘entry forbidden’. Tachiiri kinshi.”
Ebi elbowed her. “The punchline, Alice.”
Opal sighed. “Kemono no kata ni wa tachiiri kinshi. ‘Beasts keep out.’”
Amethyst made a glassy noise that I realized was a snicker. I eyed the sign, understanding who it was intended for.
“That…works? Against her?”
“If you’d believe it. Like I said, boundaries. Want one?”
I had trouble believing a flimsy piece of paper would stop the hyena from going where she pleased—unless the theory that she was some kind of fairy held water and she actually couldn’t enter without permission. But that was overly superstitious, surely—I was trying to talk myself down from the idea that she was this unstoppable force that necessitated arcane rituals to defend against. She was terrifying, without a doubt, but she was also just a pretty girl, not as much of a monster as my gut was telling me; I had to believe that if I was going to be sharing a space with her. I answered Opal with a noncommittal shrug.
My room was next in sequence after Heliotrope. Amethyst was simply too big to fit in the door, opting to remain outside with a wave. Better that than to drop her mantle even temporarily, it seemed. Ebi opened the door and ushered me through with the straight-backed precision of a maid—undercut by a wink that belied the theatrical silliness of the gesture. I limped through on my crutches and into my new home.
The doorway led into an entirely empty room: hardwood floor, white walls, a window on the far side with the blinds pulled, about the same size as my whole apartment back in Bristol. No furnishings at all—had they forgotten to give me a bed? Then I saw the archway in the left wall and had an extremely strange moment of dissonance—I simply couldn’t conceive that there was more apartment than this. My whole life as ‘Ezzen’ had effectively been in that one box; a living space larger than that harkened back to before. Before Dad had died, before magic had come to the world.
I shook it off after a moment and ventured through the archway, which led to the bedroom. A queen-size bed lay centered against the far wall in modest white linens, hotel-like. Atop it sat my backpack and my laptop next to it from when Ebi had exchanged it for the wheelchair earlier. The wall to the right of the bed was floor-to-ceiling windows—no blinds on these, so I had a view of the now-dark skyline, buildings glimmering with lights.
Ebi followed me in, helpfully answering the unasked question.
“The panels can dim.”
This building wasn’t the tallest one around, not by a long shot. Some of the others nearby were easily twice or thrice as high. The city stretched as far as I could see, until the sheer density of buildings blocked my sight further. There were a lot of cranes, some extending up toward us from ground level where others perched atop vast girders of scaffolding and structural steel, erecting the skeletons of skyscrapers-to-be. Lights twinkled in the dusk, blue from the buildings’ windows, yellow from the streets, and a whole rainbow from signs of shops at street level. I hadn’t been in a city that purported such scale since the last time I had been in NYC—nine years ago?
And I still got the sense that I was only seeing a sliver of it. The map Ebi had shown me earlier had asserted that Tokyo Tower was somewhere out there, to the south; I couldn’t see it past the jungle of obstructions. I could see the scar in the sky, though, above where the bay must be. It was a fuzzy-edged thing of yellows and greens against the darkening blue shades of the sky, catching the last of the sunset’s light on its underside.
Returning my focus to my immediate surroundings, it seemed I had a balcony. It was on the side of the window-wall closer to Heliotrope’s room, and ambling over to it, I saw that it was adjacent to her own balcony covered in what potted plants could stand up to the winter. Getting closer to the window was a bit of a mistake—I turned away before the altitude could catch up to me, surveying the rest of the room.
Against the wall with the first room sat a respectably large desk and a reasonably comfortable-looking office chair. Adjacent to it was a bookshelf that practically begged for notebooks. Meanwhile, the wall opposite the window had a frosted glass door that presumably led to the bathroom.
With the full scale of my chambers and the city beyond established—I returned to being boggled. Wasn’t everything supposed to be smaller in Japan? Opal followed us in.
“Big enough?” She sounded a bit nervous.
“Big—yeah, big enough.”
Honestly too big—both the space and the city. The room seemed desolate with its lack of decoration. I missed my posters. And my PC. Opal followed my gaze to the desk.
“Oh! We’ll give you a furnishing stipend. Technically, I can’t do that until we’ve gotten you actually signed up as an employee, but…” She looked at Ebi. “I’m authorizing you to use my card. Don’t overdo it?”
It sounded more like a question than a command. Ebi nodded with a grin. “Shopping. Love shopping. Would love it even more if I got to go out and do it someday.”
Opal replied to that with a good-natured shake of her head—then froze. At the same time, a spike of pain ran through my stump. Ebi exited the room so fast I thought she had vanished for a moment, until the whoosh of air caught up to me. Opal pursed her lips.
“Shit. I think Amane is—”
A wail pierced my chest. The voice was human, not tinkling gemstones—and carried an agony too familiar to me by half, far more intense than the momentary burst of sharp discomfort I had experienced. Opal’s tail lashed in response as she glanced back toward the entrance.
“Um. This is somewhat regular for her. Residuals. I was hoping—well, it’s not serious, I think, but—” Another piercing wail and a ragged gasp. We both flinched. “Can you do without Ebi for tonight?”
I nodded as the spike passed. My prosthetic’s analgesics were taking care of it—the same could not be said for Amane, apparently. This wasn’t serious? I felt I should do something more, and limped back into the anteroom to have a look. Opal came with, chewing her lip. I hurriedly ditched the crutches, leaning onto the doorframe as I pulled the door open.
It was bad. Amane was back in her flesh form, curled up on the floor, clutching her stomach. Ebi knelt next to her and had rolled up Amane’s hoodie, which revealed the patchwork of scarring around her belly. One of Ebi’s hands had morphed into some kind of IV unit and connected to a port implanted in the Radiance’s midriff—I shouldn’t be seeing this. I averted my eyes as Opal pulled the door open further and slipped past me toward her teammate—her girlfriend? Not the time. She turned back to me just outside the threshold, apologetic and a little awkward.
“I’m sorry about this.”
“No—don’t worry, it’s fine, really, I get it. Um—if I can help…”
I trailed off, because there wasn’t a lot I could do other than commiserate. But Opal’s expression softened. “You might. Not now, but…well, we’ll talk more about it later.” She turned to approach Amane, comforting words halfway out her mouth—
Amane sat up partway, propping herself up on her mechanical elbow, and hissed something at the two of them through gritted teeth. Opal hesitated, looking between me and her, and stepped aside from where she had surreptitiously placed herself to block my line of sight to her teammate’s exposure. Amane met my eyes.
“Tachinasai. Stand up.”
“Um—what?”
I parsed the words, at least the English ones—I just didn’t get it. She muttered something to Ebi, who sighed and pointed at my prosthetic foot, which I was still gingerly holding above the floor as I leaned against the doorframe.
“Put the weight on your foot. Humor her.”
I wasn’t sure what they were getting at, but I complied, bracing for pain. My arm tensed against the doorframe. First the toe, then the heel—a small jolt of residual pain made me flinch. I hesitated again—braced myself as I put weight on it. The pain was more of a throb than a sharp spike, so it wasn’t too bad once I settled my weight more.
Amane nodded seriously. With trembling limbs, she carefully maneuvered herself more upright, and Ebi came in to support her and bring her to her feet. Despite how her hand trembled as she brushed the hair out of her face, despite the pain behind those viridian eyes, one original and one facsimile, despite how she couldn’t even stand under her own power—or perhaps because of those things—I got the message.
We’re not made of glass. It transcended spoken language. She wanted me to know—I took my hand off the doorframe slowly. My balance was shaky, but this mattered in some ineffable way. The moment dragged on a bit, a little awkward—Amane managed a smile, tight with pain though it was. Opal shook her head a bit, somewhere between pleased with the connection and exasperated by her teammate’s bullheadedness, and came to her other side. She stroked her hair with what sounded like a gentle scolding for the stunt before turning back to me.
“Um—I’m sorry. She’s going to need care for the rest of the night—if you need something, text me. Depending on how tonight goes, this might interfere with tomorrow, so…well, we’ll figure it out in the morning. Good night, and, er, sorry again for how sudden this is.”
The dragon gave me a hurried bow, ever-formal in her mannerisms if not her language, and swept up her teammate in what looked to be a well-practiced princess carry. That didn’t look very comfortable for the sickly girl—but Opal was far stronger than her size suggested, and it wasn’t far back to their room. Ebi followed them, and the three vanished beyond the threshold three doors down. My phone buzzed. I went back to leaning on the doorframe and hop-stumbled my way back to my room, following the walls for support, before flopping face-first onto the bed as I pulled out my phone.
ebi-furai: she’ll be alright
ebi-furai: thanks for respecting her
ezzen: Wouldn’t anybody?
ebi-furai: well, you saw opal
I had. In fairness, I’d be worried too—and there was a long history there, and I felt sort of guilty for having witnessed it…but Amane had wanted me to see. It wasn’t just that she was tough.
There was also the question of what had generated that first ripple. I’d find out later.
I laid there for a little while, just processing the new space, smelling the fresh sheets. My foot had stopped hurting, at least, no longer aggravated—I was still cautious of it as I reached for my backpack and began to rummage. I wasn’t going to distract Ebi with worrying about furnishings for now, but I had might as well make myself at home with what I had.
—
I had never really learned to cook. Or at least, nothing fancy, nothing for fun. I knew simple dishes, stuff that was a more efficient use of my welfare money than takeaway, but I had never had the cash or interest to take it up as a hobby. This stood in stark contrast to my dad, who had been a chef of sufficient renown to take him, and me, across the world. He had gotten me my own chef’s knife of respectable quality for my twelfth birthday and taught me basic knife skills and preparation techniques. He had been intending to teach me as much as he could.
Other than possibly the notebooks—depending on how you valued them—the knife was the most expensive item in my backpack sans the laptop, and I had brought it with me as much for the pawn-value-to-weight ratio as for the general utility and self-defense options it offered. In the moment, sentimentality had been secondary to survival. Seeing as how neither survival nor money were an issue anymore, I was now faced with the strange task of deciding where the knife and its siblings fit into my new life.
The backpack was the only thing they had managed to recover, having been on my person; the PCTF had beaten Todai to my apartment, and Opal had decided that they had already poked enough bears. My laptop’s fate had been a no-brainer; it was already on the nightstand, though for want of a charger—Japan used different power sockets than the UK. The notebooks, too, had already found a home on the otherwise-barren bookshelf, which had taken me an awkward, limping journey across the room. I had left the crutches at the door—didn’t feel like acknowledging them in the privacy and security of my own room, even though it was awkward to move around.
Amane had somewhat inspired me, anyway. I embarked on a limited exploration into the bathroom when the need had arisen, discovering with equal parts embarrassment and relief that it had been furnished with a fair number of handrails—how thoughtful. It also had a real bath, separate from the shower, and a sophisticated toilet with rather too many buttons; everything about the furnishings in here was multiple levels more expensive than what I was used to. I still hadn’t quite shaken the impression that I was in a fancy hotel—a more familiar setting from my childhood than any kind of permanent living situation this opulent and spacious.
I washed my hands, leaning on the countertop to keep my balance. I didn’t look great according to the mirror—a cursory rinse of my face felt good but didn’t improve matters. That was fine, even familiar; though part of me wanted to look a bit more presentable in front of the girls, that was hardly a problem for tonight. Toweling off my face, I realized belatedly that I should have brought over the toiletries that had been in my backpack. Whatever; again, no hurry, and my moisturizer traditionally lived near my clothes rather than in the bathroom anyway.
The journey back to the bedroom was a little fraught, once again following along the wall. My gait had improved ever-so-slightly with the marginal bit of practice, but it was still more of a hopping limp than anything resembling a proper walk. I returned to the bed and looked over the remaining items that had yet to find a home while I said good morning to the American members of the chatroom starting their day. That aspect of the change in location would take some getting used to.
I looked out the windows again, reflecting on both my literal reflection and the larger cityscape. Night had fallen proper now, and the city was alive with lights beyond, above and below. What would this vista look like in the morning or from ground-level? A flash of motion pulled my gaze to the left toward the balcony—
Hina waved at me and tapped on the reinforced glass. I stared at her. She smiled at me and motioned with her hands like turning a door handle. I pointed at my prosthetic foot with some indignation. She smacked her forehead and opened the balcony door herself, letting a blast of cold air into the room.
“I didn’t invite you in.”
“I’m not a fairy.”
That confirmation was cold comfort—the sign wouldn’t have stopped her anyway. Fantastic.
“Why are you—in my room?”
“Housewarming? Figured you could use some help getting set up.”
That was probably true, at least; I needed that charger, and I wasn’t about to wander around the penthouse in search of cables in my current state or ask the others when they were busy helping Amethyst. Even so.
“The balcony?”
She closed the door and came over to the bed, leaning on it. “Don’t think Alice wants to see me right now. I saw the calendar update—you’re on board?”
Alice didn’t want to see her because she kept bothering me, if I understood correctly. I rather shared the sentiment—I mustered my courage, though I couldn’t meet her eyes.
“Please get out.”
The puppy didn’t respond. She just stood there with her big, blue eyes, head tilted slightly, waiting for me to answer the question.
I sighed. “I agreed to join Todai.” I hastily appended a clarification. “Not as a Radiance.”
“Yay! I knew you’d come around.”
She apparently took that as consent to sit across from me, the spread of items from my backpack between us. I guessed I was stuck with her. Should I call for someone? Message Ebi or Opal? She picked up the knife, and I swiftly abandoned those ideas.
“Hm. This hasn’t been sharpened in a while. We’ve got a stone in the kitchen. Are you any good with one? I can teach you.” Her gaze roamed to the earbuds, little-used. “These are cheap, right? I have nicer ones you can borrow, in-ear, really comfy. I have some in white that would look good on you, I think.”
She looked a bit more ruffled than when I had last seen her. Where had she gone? I eyed the knife as she twirled it in her grip.
“I—know how to use it.”
She ran her fingertip along the blade. It didn’t draw blood—whether that was just because it was that dull or due to something about her body, I couldn’t guess. She looked at me, eyes half-lidded, and purred.
“Not all the ways, I bet.”
My tattoo itched. I had to make space between us, had to get away from this thing—my body refused to move. Her eyes slid down to my arm, apparently fully able to see how my subconscious had gripped the leading edge of the lattice containing my spear.
“Man, they did a great job. Can I have a look?”
Don’t upset the pretty hyena-girl with the knife, Ezzen. I held out my forearm hesitantly, and she leaned in to admire Ebi’s precise inking. Too close—she sniffed it, and goosebumps ran up my arms and back.
“Some of the old lattice is still in here, looks like. She’s such a softie.” She looked up at me. “Do you like it?”
“It’s—good. Better.” I really didn’t want to articulate how it was better; words like ‘blood’ and ‘pain’ would set her off. She grinned at me and practically read my mind—grabbed my wrist. I flinched and made to take out my spear—
I couldn’t. She was holding the lattice in place, somehow, digging her thumb into the strands of the weave, preventing me from pulling on it with my Flame. I had a horrible image of her taking the knife and carving the tattoo off, making my defenselessness permanent. What she actually did bothered me more. She leaned in further and nuzzled the tattoo, breath warming my skin. That was already far too much skinship for me, and my body was misinterpreting the situation—then she licked the inked spear, from the tip at the wrist up toward the elbow. I shivered. The saliva clung to my arm in her tongue’s passing, turning the chilly winter air frigid. Then she backed off, releasing my wrist.
“Good, good. It suits you.” She licked her lips as she put down the knife, turning her attention to my laptop. “That needs stickers. And a charger?”
I was still frozen—the part of me that needed her to leave right now was paralyzed by the part that didn’t want to wipe off the spit, that needed something else from her.
“What—what the hell?”
“Hm?”
She was going to make me say it? “Why did you…lick…”
“You taste good! And your lattice is there, so it’s nice and warm and—ugh, there’s not a word. It’s nice.” She frowned. “Too far?”
Yes! Entirely too far! But I couldn’t bring myself to say that. As the seconds dragged on in silence, she tilted her head. “I can let you do me, if you want. Then we’ll be even.”
She had to have heard the innuendo there.
“That’s—so not the problem.” What the hell had Opal been talking about? This girl had zero understanding of boundaries.
She shrugged. “Suit yourself.” She repeated herself. “That needs stickers. And a charger.”
I let out the breath I was holding, gratefully jumping onto the far safer topic to distract myself from how warm my body was getting and the lingering chill on my arm. Anything to get her out of the room.
“Uh—yes, charger, please.”
To my dismay, she simply reached into a non-space and rummaged around a bit. The exact thing her arm did made my head hurt, the same kind of ache as when I had woven my blood binding. My magical senses didn’t like whatever she was doing. I took advantage of the moment of distraction to wipe the spit off my forearm. She produced an appropriate charger. Magical curiosity momentarily overrode the fear.
“Did you just—have that ready to go?”
“Nah. We’ve got a bin full of random cables.”
She had portaled? That was a Vaetna thing, the same principle as the Gates, and she did it and spoke about it like it was casual. What had happened to second-best? The question was becoming more and more of a refrain for me—what was she? Hina returned to scanning the items, pointing at the moisturizer cream.
“For your scars?”
“They dry out.”
She picked it up and turned it around, reading the fine print.
“Oh, I can get you something better than this for sure. Amane probably already has something. She doing okay?”
She must have felt the ripple as well. “She’s…you’d know better than I would. She could stand, at least.”
“Good. Better you saw that now rather than later, honestly. You’re one of us now.”
I objected. “I’m—no, I said I didn’t sign up to be a Radiance.”
“I don’t mean a Radiance, silly. That’s for later. I mean a flamebearer, and if you’re living with us, then I gotta take care of you like I do her.”
My psyche was generating some rather provocative ways to interpret that as innuendo. She continued to search across the items, looking for ways to be helpful—or just invade my privacy. She found a good one, holding up the spare underwear.
“We’re going shopping. You’re going to need more than this.”
I snatched them away from her, going for a retort against the furthest invasion of privacy so far—then stopped, because that was a great point, actually. Clothes hadn’t even crossed my mind. Even so—
“What?”
“We are going shopping. You are going to need more than this.” She enunciated each word.
Doing that kind of thing alone with any girl was far enough outside my comfort zone as it was, but with her in particular? My imagination began to spin the fantasy of a date—I resented that. It acceded and instead proposed the notion of her riding me in a dressing room. What the fuck, brain?
“I heard you the first time. I’ll just…order something online.”
She pouted. “That defeats the purpose! We’re getting you acclimated. It’ll be a fun day in town! You weren’t awake on the way in, so you didn’t even see the city from overhead, and there’s so much more to see down at street level. Tokyo’s fun! Promise!”
Now it was my turn to pout. I wasn’t very used to modulating my expressions face-to-face, and Hina had a way of sort of drawing those things out from me anyway. Her reactivity demanded reciprocation.
“It’s—I don’t feel like going out. I’m still recovering.”
It was a lame excuse, and we both knew it.
“I literally saw Alice schedule you going out tomorrow.”
“For paperwork. Not shopping.”
“You’ll be done by one! Let me take you somewhere after! It’ll be fun, and you need to learn how to get around the city anyway and blahblahblah. And I’m great at clothes.”
She was certainly well-dressed. I didn’t doubt that she could probably pick out something nice for me, but clothes were…not something I really cared about, not enough to justify being at her mercy for a few hours. I knew I was a medium, and that was about it. I looked for another excuse.
“I’ll—just ask one of the others.”
She scooted forward on the bed to poke me. “Play the game, Ezzen.”
“What?” Why would I engage with this, other than fear? She made me vividly uncomfortable.
“Negotiation is part of being a Radiance.”
What, this was training? “I didn’t even sign up for that!”
She sighed dramatically. “Gosh, fine. I’ll sweeten the deal. You’ll get to walk tomorrow, really walk. Run and fight too, if you want. Not that limping thing you’re doing right now.”
How long had she been watching me? I was doing just fine, thank you very much, Amethyst had been quite inspirational—but curiosity tugged at me, and I knew she could tell. It was in her eyes. So blue.
“How?”
“We’re working on a thing. But I’m only giving it to you if you promise to come shopping tomorrow. That’s lesson one: Le-ver-age.”
She sat back on the bed, exuding the air of a teacher—well, more like an old monk you found on a mountaintop. The effect was a little absurd given her appearance and the context, but I had to admit that the lesson itself was good, if underhanded—not very magical girl. I had been expecting that sort of maneuvering to be part of Opal’s sphere of instruction if it were to come up, but perhaps she was too principled for this. Hina wasn’t.
“That’s cheap.”
“Mhm.”
If they were working on something like that—surely Hina couldn’t withhold it from me on the grounds that I refused to go out with her. The other Radiances would have my back. I had a mind to reach for my phone, to ask Opal to rescue me from this ridiculous situation—but didn’t, because…she had told me Hina would respect boundaries. And I thought, just maybe, that Hina was trying to teach me how to deal with her, how to not fold to her pressure.
“Um—fuck, alright, fine. First…you’re paying?”
“Sure. It’s all Alice’s money anyway, really.”
Comments like those made my new financial circumstances a bit more real. Emboldened, I started to rattle off other stipulations.
“No tricks or I’ll tell Ebi on you. And no, uh—dress-up. We go in, we get clothes I like, we get out. Also, no—paparazzi?” Was that something I had to be worried about? She was high-profile and hard to miss, another thing adding to my anxiety.
“Sure. In-and-out, nice and simple. And we’ll be undercover, promise. It’ll be your first mission!”
I didn’t like that phrasing, but perhaps the veneer of professionalism would make her less…unsafe. Or maybe that was wishful thinking. If nothing else—walking would be so nice. Hobbling around my room had just underscored my desire to be back on my feet, even if it was only temporary. I had missed a day of spear practice. Two days, actually. That alone was enough, honestly—but I pulled out my phone just to confirm. Opal had said to tell her if I needed something—but I was more comfortable talking to Ebi, and this was her department anyway.
[Direct Message] ezzen: Is Amethyst doing alright? Can you multitask well enough to talk?
ebi-furai: yeah, shes pretty stable. just gonna keep an eye on her tonight
ebi-furai: whats up
ezzen: Hina wants to take me shopping tomorrow. Give me an excuse?
ebi-furai: medically youre cleared
ezzen: Can’t you lie for me?
Hina was getting further into my personal space. “Gimme. I wanna talk to her too.”
ebi-furai: i could
ebi-furai: wanna get away from her that bad, huh
ebi-furai: …oh shit is she WITH you
ezzen: no im not
I scrambled to get my phone back from the smaller girl, who was having no trouble evading me even without leaving the bed.
ebi-furai: hi sapphire
ebi-furai: amane is having a flare-up so let me make this clear
ebi-furai: IF YOU GIVE ME MORE WORK TOMORROW IM FEEDING YOU TO OPAL
ebi-furai: be gentle with him.
Hina read aloud from the phone; her voice had tightened at the word “flare-up.” She tossed the phone back to me for verification. Empathy for Amethyst, on top of the previous deal, got the better of me. At least we’d be out of Ebi’s hair—actually, if I spent the whole day with Hina, Opal wouldn’t have to leave Amethyst’s side tomorrow morning either…
“Fine.”
“Yay! It’s a date.”
I blushed at the use of the word, despite myself. She poked me. “Not like that. You could have used your leverage for that, though. Call that lesson two.”
My blush deepened. “That’s…” I searched for a way to frame my objection as something other than the embarrassment it obviously was. “That’s…transactional. Exploitative, even.”
She nodded sagely again, spreading her hands expansively as if imparting great wisdom. “Lesson two.”
That wasn’t an answer, and moreover it was making me actually interrogate the notion. Once again, not very magical girl of her. Or so I thought—I had no basis of knowledge for the genre from which Todai took its inspiration, beyond what Star had ranted about over the years and the briefest explanation Opal had provided when she was making her pitch. Hina practically read my mind.
“Yeah, yeah, Alice wouldn’t be happy to hear that. But this is the real world! Our hands have to get dirty, no matter what my dragony best friend wants to pretend. Leverage matters, getting what you want matters.” The hyena had crept into her gaze a bit, her voice getting sultrier. “So—do you want it to be a date? Wait, no, lemme simplify. Do you want me?”
I was pinned by her gaze. Too direct, far too direct. How could I even answer that? I didn’t want to—because I knew I’d say yes if I could work up the courage. She just sat there, waiting. Waiting. She was awfully good at it for someone so pushy. I tried to change the subject.
“I’ll—I’d like those earbuds, if you’re still…offering…”
She tilted her head, almost as if she hadn’t heard me. I had a terrible premonition. She was about to pounce, attack me, tear me to shreds and eat me—
The spear came out, near-instinctive, a lizard-brain response to the danger in her poise, somehow more immediate than when she had been holding the knife. She looked at the warped tip and shook her head, rolling those sapphire eyes. “Lesson three—”
And she was past it instantly, pushing me down, leaning over me—
“Don’t escalate to violence when you’re outgunned.”
She straddled me. I couldn’t look away from those sapphire eyes with their stitched irises. She had pinned my wrist to the sheets, intractable, vastly stronger than me despite her petite frame. Her other palm pressed my shoulder down, slender fingers curling around and gripping my sleeve. She leaned down, down, until her hair was tickling my face. She smelled like a sea breeze—and just a bit of alcohol. She had been drinking. Her gaze held an endless blue horizon, intoxicating freedom on her breath.
“What’ll it be?”
She was so warm against the room’s cool air, and I could barely think past the way my heart was pounding. The sensation of her thighs locking me in place was insisting that I did want her—if only in some misfiring, unfamiliar, hormonal way dredged up by years of isolation rather than a connection of personality, because I refused to believe something like her could be so attractive. She was far too pretty, temptation incarnate. Her hips over mine were a promise in themselves, making my imagination run wild with scenes of rough, desperate motion where she took whatever she wanted from me. I was horrified at how appealing that was—a part of me left nearly untouched over the years was being baited to the surface and discovering it liked what it saw.
I was paralyzed. Moments passed, molasses down the hourglass. My eyes wandered down to her lips, ethereally soft. They moved faintly as she breathed, almost panting, the motion transmitted down through her chest to where our bodies met. I found myself breathing heavily as well, and if I were braver, my free hand would have come up around her waist and—suffice to say the situation was unbearable. She was clearly content to wait for me to actually make a move, another prompt-and-wait, and I couldn’t bring myself to do so—in either direction, neither pushing her off of me nor taking the plunge into rougher contact. We just lay there, her unwilling and me unable to resolve the moment. And part of me didn’t want it to end.
Eventually, end it did. She pushed herself off of me, fixing her hair. I lay there, thoroughly awash in new sensations and emotions, confusing and appealing. Why was I so attracted to…whatever she was? I mean—at her core, she was a pretty girl, one displaying clear interest in me; that was easy enough to understand. But the…monstrousness? The feeling that there was something wrong and fundamentally dangerous about her—and being excited by that? It was insane, ridiculous, something out of a bad Vaetna shipfic. Why me? Why did she want me to pursue her?
“Okay, noted. You freeze up under pressure. We’ll work on that.”
Incredulity and wounded pride jarred me into motion. I sat up, the terror receding.
“That was not a test.”
“Sure it was. You didn’t say it. Either you want me or you don’t.”
“I—” I still couldn’t. “I escaped the Peacies! How is that freezing up?”
“Totally different. Any VNT can magic their way out of a bad spot, especially if they’re as clever as you. But if you can’t even talk yourself out from under me, you’re gonna end up in spots where magic can’t help you.”
She had a point, probably—but I was so offended at the idea that there was a problem I couldn’t learn to solve with magic, a familiar emotion that I latched onto so that I wouldn’t have to think about what had almost happened between us and the alien emotions surging through me.
“I could have—”
She blurred, and my forehead hurt. Had she just flicked me?
“No, you couldn’t. I had you dead to rights. I could have done whatever.I. Wanted. And besides, you didn’t escape, right? I saved you.”
Another annoying thrill ran through me at the truth of that, fear and excitement percolating off one another. She nodded at the spear.
“Put that thing away. We’re done for tonight.”
Indignation spiked. I could choose, damn her.
“I—I don’t want to go on a date with you.”
I wasn’t prepared for that, not with her, not on top of everything else that had happened to me. Hina looked at me carefully, up and down. Her gaze punched right through me.
“But?”
There was indeed a but.
“But I do…want…”
I couldn’t say it out loud. My heartbeat was deafening.
“Say it and I’ll kiss you.”
My eyes dropped to her lips, curled in a grin. She made a show of licking them. I was above an incentive that cheap.
…or so I had thought. The words tumbled out, provoked by—all of this.
“I want you.”
I had never said anything like that in my life, to anyone. We were in uncharted waters. A big smile spread across the hyena’s face. I was in her trap.
“There you go.”
A heart-throbbing rush.
“What—why me? Why all of this?”
She drew close again, so very near against me. The smell of alcohol invaded my senses once more as she crawled forward—but ‘crawl’ was such an inelegant word for how she moved. She crept, padded, stalking forward like a lengthening shadow.
“Because I can hurt you and you won’t break.”
What a cruel person. What terrifying honesty. Everyone had warned me what she was like, and I had seen enough hints today—so why did that only make me want her more? Why didn’t I tell her to leave? Why did I let her embrace me? It was all happening too fast, and I just couldn’t say no to her, not like this. I didn’t want to.
She purred against my neck. “Ai told you, didn’t she? We trade in pain. Humans don’t get it, but you do.”
It will hurt, the voices had said. Her hand moved down my arm to grope at the scarred flesh on my right hand, reminiscent of the massage therapy I had undergone to encourage the flesh to heal correctly. But her squeezes almost hurt. Almost?
My voice trembled, trying to find the conviction I had felt with Ai. “No. I don’t want to hurt it.”
“Why not? It hurt you first. Twice. And you saw what it did to Amane.”
There was a nightmarish truth in that, prodding at the feeling of betrayal I had felt when it hadn’t obeyed me in the darkness, and the ache in my chest at how the Amethyst Radiance had been curled up on the floor. Hina went on, lacing her fingers through mine. I didn’t resist.
“So hurt it back. I do. I’m great at it. It’s push and pull, you know? Make it an exchange. Leverage—I hurt it, it hurts me, we give each other what we want. We have an understanding, me and my Light.”
Her breath warmed my neck. I struggled to get the words out. Focus on magic, not her.
“What does it want?”
What did she?
“To help us grow. To become. I let it change me, so does Alice. Can’t you see?”
Her claws came to my shirt and shredded the collar, the tips stinging my skin as she pulled and gouged. She tugged the scraps off my shoulders and admired the exposed flesh. A flash of those sharp, inhuman teeth as she licked her lips. A full-body shiver took me, naked fear bubbling up and turning to anticipation, powerless to resist. All I could do was object against my instincts.
“Change? Your mutations?”
“It’s so much more than that. I’ll show you. You just have to trust me. Let me hurt you! It’ll be fun, I promise.”
“Wh—what about what Ebi said?”
“I won’t hurt you badly enough to bother her. You’re no fun if you break.”
Did I believe she had that level of control? Truth be told—it didn’t matter.
“All you have to do is say you want it, and I’ll give you everything.”
And then she waited. I stood on the precipice of all my principles—and I wasn’t Heung, who could simply ignore gravity’s call as he perched above the void. I was only mortal, beholden to natural laws and unnatural desires. She called me down, down, promising depths I had never seen with my head craned up toward the Spire. I fell with a whisper.
“Please.”
She bit my shoulder, and I made a sound that I had never made before, that I had never dreamed could come from my mouth. It was a cocktail of primal emotion given voice, terror and overstimulation and more, please more of whatever twisted desire this was, whatever she was. Only that horrible moan in the darkness of the buried car came close, but this was pain as tantalizing promise, not rage-inducing punishment. The razor-teeth drew blood, just barely, a circle of red pinpricks. She lapped at the oozing ichor before the wounds clotted, grooming and feeding, mate and predator.
She pulled back to fix me with those awful, intoxicating blue eyes once more.
“Ai thinks her path is closest to the Vaetna’s. She’s wrong. It’s made me so strong. Stronger than all the others, because I don’t fight my nature. Our nature. There’s so much more to magic than glyphs.”
She came in and bit me again, less of a chomp, more of a gnaw. She was so warm against me, one hand pressing my shoulder against her mouth while the other kneaded my neck. I gasped—she was strong, even in just her fingers. That would bruise, tomorrow. Objections swirled in my mind, my revulsion at the treatment of her Flame she was implying. But—“closest to the Vaetna’s?” Change? That was awful in its own way, by implication, but if it were true—
“Let me show you how. I said it this morning—you could be so good at this. You could be perfect.”
She was everything I wanted, just all twisted around. I could still learn from Ai, from the others, and find a path I could live with. But for now, feeling her against me, the promise of power I was worthy of wielding but had been denied all my life, true understanding of whatever new rules her very nature promised—
I had been tense against her, letting her do what she wanted to me, head abuzz with the paralytic promise of her predations. But now I ventured to touch her. My hand found her shoulder, and slowly moved up to her neck. In a mirror of her own motions and intimations, guided by some strange, unfamiliar instinct, my rough, scarred fingers clawed at her throat. She luxuriated in it, her eyes sliding shut. Her hand came over mine.
“Mm. But no, we do it like this.”
She tugged my hand down to her sternum, then pressed—
And I felt the Flame inside her, ice-cold, pulsing in my magical senses in rhythm with her heartbeat. She made a sound that etched itself into my memory, a growling thing, an animal response to a transcendental connection. But I was learning the Flame was just as animal as we were, in its own way. She rubbed the same place on my chest with her other hand—I coughed as my own Flame stirred in response.
“This is what we are. This is why I brought you here.”
She’s so selfish.
I didn’t care, not right then. She wrapped her hand around the back of my neck, pulled me to her, and—her lips were so soft. It quickly became a full-body act as she leaned onto me, tilting her head and chasing me down onto the sheets as we had lain before. It was messy and warm and full of desire like nothing I had ever known. Our flames danced around each other, inspecting, exploring, both parasite-symbiotes mimicking the motion of our tongues. Eventually, air became a problem, and I made to push her off of me—
I couldn’t. She might as well have been {AFFIXED} atop me. I squirmed, beginning to panic at the oxygen deprivation. Get off me, damn it! I made a sound against her lips, struggling, feeling myself begin to drop as the edges of black unconsciousness crept in—
Only then did she get off me, breaking the contact. I took a heaving gasp—and then choked as her Flame separated from mine. An involuntary keening sound escaped my throat. It was raw, an exposed nerve. So cold. When I regained myself enough to meet her eyes, gasping gulps of air, there was naked enjoyment on her face.
“See? Isn’t that just the best?”
I stared up at her, chest rising and falling with shuddering breaths as my lungs and heart recovered. I’d been helpless under her, I could have died. I couldn’t get away from her, couldn’t bring myself to call for help—I had to play her game, use my leverage. Establish boundaries.
“That—what the fuck? Never do—”
But I did want her to do it again. That scared me even more than she did.
“…just warn me?”
As establishing boundaries went—blatant failure. I just wanted it too much; she had a kind of power over me beyond the physical dominance. She nodded happily.
“Sure thing! I’ll help you get used to it! And you’ll get better at it, and hurt me back, and it’ll be awesome. We’ll have so much fun and you’ll become so strong and we’ll have the best sex, I promise, humans can’t do it like we do.”
Well. That was…far too appealing. “So this is all for…your sadomasochism?”
“You’re missing the point. You’ll change no matter what. You already have.” She took my other hand, rubbing the tattoo. “That’s our nature—I saw my chance and I’m taking it, letting you become something that will make us both happy.”
I knew what she meant.
“A Radiance.” Was the term as descriptive of a specific type of posthuman as ‘Vaetna’ was? “This is your pitch?”
She closed the gap between us again, but stopped before our lips met.
“Just trust me. Can I keep convincing you?”
I wanted very much for her to continue to do that, and it was such a relief that she was asking—thatshe was respecting the new boundary, such as it was. I whispered assent. We were finding a kind of rhythm, a push-and-pull.
“Please.”
She kissed me again, this time much lighter, a more standard sort of affection than the suffocation play. It was sort of disappointing.
“Sorry if I scared you.”
This was such a turnaround from the overbearing, unstoppable desire she had been forcing upon me, the predatory pursuit—I suddenly picked up on what she had been doing.
“That was a test too, wasn’t it?”
“Mhm. I’m, uh, not so good at knowing when to stop. So it’s better if you decide for me.”
“And you didn’t open with this because…?”
“Got carried away. You’re just so edible.”
I shivered, again feeling the certainty that she would kill and eat me. But—and this was truly boggling—she had a deeper interest in me than that, which somehow meant I was safe with her, despite her open admission that she wanted to hurt me. She went on, rubbing my neck more gently than before.
“It’s—well, I felt the pulse too. Not sure where it came from—Yuuka would know, but she’s not here. And it…got me a bit worked up. I wanted to play with you.”
It was all just play to her, both the violence and the gestures of carnal want. At last I asked. I had to know, had to reconcile the puppy and the hyena, the girl and the monster, establish a label for the fear and desire she pulled up from the bottom of my brain—was there any boundary between those things?
“What are you?”
Hina chuckled, leaning back too far, ultramarine eyes half-hooded. Her figure gave the impression of corded, fast-twitch muscle for pouncing and killing despite how soft she had felt against me, a natural predator wearing the blouse and skirt of a young woman.
“I’m me!”
And so she was. Puppy, hyena, fairy—it was just her. It had been a bit silly of me to ascribe mere animal traits to her, for all her carnivorous aspect. She was beautiful in the same way a glyph was, magic twisted for awful and glorious purpose—no mere beast, nor fair folk bound by folkloric rules. She was something wild and free, irrepressible as the Vaetna. I craved her.
“You scare the shit out of me, you know that?” It just sort of slipped out, such a contrast from the way I had had to force every word earlier.
“Mhm. Doesn’t seem like a dealbreaker for you, though.”
She had me, and I couldn’t quite bring myself to admit that, despite how obvious it had been in my actions.
“The others will…hate me for this, I think.” How was I supposed to balance her against them, if she could draw me down this path so easily?
“It’ll work out. I’m not monopolizing you. They all want to change you in their own ways, too.”
Such was the nature of a flamebearer, pulled in multiple directions by every faction with the reach to do so. I was experiencing in micro the same thing as that anonymous oil rig worker in the Gulf of Mexico. But her pitch was too good, too compatible with what I already wanted and what the others were offering, bolstered by the seductive appeal. All it would cost me was pain—and I could endure that, I wasn’t made of glass. For power—the power I deserved, and for more of this, with her?
“Show me.”
She looked so happy and kissed me a third time, clutching me, making little noises against my lips. Then she backed off.
“Tell me to leave. If I stay I’ll fuck you up.”
There was a real temptation to beg for her to stay, to let her bring some of my budding fantasies into reality. I resisted—more for Amane’s sake by proxy than concern for my own wellbeing. What was she doing to me?
She gave me one last, long look before she left the room.
It was both hunger and approval.
Author’s Note:
Whew. Spicy.
Uh, hi, website readers! These chapters are being put up months after they were first posted over on Scribblehub, so the author’s notes have been pretty sparse until now to keep me from muddying the chapter’s impression with my retrospective rambling. But I’m breaking my silence, because I know that for some readers, this chapter will put them off the story as a whole.
Back when I originally posted this chapter, I was very, very nervous, and indeed the reaction to Hina after this chapter has been rather…split, though overall far more positive than I was expecting. Who knows, that may have partially been SHub selection bias. Either way, for those of you who got a lot of ick from this chapter but made it to the end: I’m going to ask you to trust me. This won’t get glossed over.
For the rest of you, those who did like this scene: teeth! That will be all.
Thanks as usual to Softies, Zak, Maria, Cassiopeia for beta reading.
Join the Discord to discuss the story and hang out with other Sunspot readers!
Join the Patreon to support the story and read chapters three weeks ahead of public!
The scuffle ended fast, from the sound of it. I saw none of it myself; I only knew things were coming to a close when someone yowled and the arguing resumed again. Hopefully, Hina wasn’t about to come in here and cause more of a fuss.
“How do any of them have time for this?”
VNTs, and even the Vaetna themselves, tended to be stretched fairly thin. Magic was too flexible and powerful to do without, and there was always more work to be done.
“It’s a holiday.”
It was? I checked my phone—February 12th—but Ebi beat me to it.
“Kenkoku kinen no hi, the day Japan was founded. They get national holidays off, aside from emergencies.”
That hadn’t come up during my bout of research—why would it have? It occurred to me that I should find a vlog or something to catch up on these little details; my ignorance was embarrassing, and would only become more so with time. I resolved to not get distracted next time.
“Just holidays?”
“And Sundays. So no promotions, press conferences, general peacekeeping…they’re still ready for an earthquake or flamefall.”
“That’s why Heliotrope is out in the Gulf.”
“Actually, no, she’s there voluntarily. They’re only obligated to respond to things that directly affect Japan.”
Right, right, the facts were coming back to me now, yanked from the bottom of the drawer where I kept political knowledge, things I already knew but hadn’t gotten to in my research. Todai was lower-intervention than the Spire by a substantial margin; one of the videos had mentioned friction between them and the Japanese government regarding showing their face in the South China Sea.
“Voluntarily?”
“She’s a grad student in life sciences, you know. She couldn’t stand by while an oil spill goes full Dubai, even if that’s way outside our usual domain.”
Ai had implicitly framed Heliotrope as more ‘mahou shoujo’ than some of her teammates—apparently this was part of that. Speaking of whom—the Emerald Radiance re-entered the room, looking more tired than ever. I realized she was using her day off to help take care of me. She bowed. “I am so, so sorry for my friends’ behavior.”
“Um—it’s fine, don’t worry. Ebi was telling me it wasn’t that serious?”
She nodded. “It wasn’t…we can be done for today.”
“You’re leaving the foot attached?”
“Yes. Ebi-tan will be with you, so you can try to stand and maybe walk a little if you feel like it. We’ll meet again tomorrow if I can find the time. Otherwise, your physical therapy will be with her. Ebi-tan, take him to his room?”
I raised my hand. Ai had a sort of authority figure energy, somewhere between teacherly and motherly. I supposed that was fitting, if I was reading her relationship with Ebi correctly. “How would my…training actually work? If I stay?”
Ebi’s turn. “All the Radiances will be helping with your recovery and training. Ai just has the most to do at the moment since for now your prosthetic has to come first.”
I considered this. “I’m having a hard time picturing Hina giving lessons.”
I hadn’t quite intended it to be a joke, but the two women laughed and had a brief back-and-forth in Japanese, which sounded from the tone like:
“He’s not wrong.”
“It’ll be fine, probably.”
Ebi switched back to English. “Don’t worry about her for now. They just gave her a pretty thorough thrashing, I think. If you don’t have any more questions, I’m taking you to your actual room, not the medical ward. After that, no more bed for you.”
Three cheers for medical magic. “Wheelchair?”
“For now. We’ll make some more interim upgrades tomorrow that might let you walk.” Ebi frowned. “Pending Sapphire’s cooperation.”
What did she have to do with that? Then a more mundane, large-scale worry than fear of the hyena. “Will…I have to pay for all this?”
I didn’t know anything about the Japanese healthcare system; I envisioned a bill with so many zeroes on the end that I would lose track, a relic of my experiences in American hospitals before they had sent me back to the UK. Ultimately, inferno recovery programs had footed the bill that time, but things might work differently here. Ai frowned and did some rapid back-and-forth with Ebi, who eventually turned back to me.
“Not your problem. Opal thinks you’d be a meaningful enough return on investment that we’re happy to cover all your costs of living and give you a stipend, the way we do for the Radiances. The foot and tattoo are entirely on the house even if you don’t stick around.”
What did you even say to that? “Thanks” didn’t cover it, really—with what they were offering, I simply wouldn’t have to think about money. No more scraping the edge of the poverty line. The cynic in me wondered if making me feel indebted to their generosity was another carrot to get me to stay. Still—carrot was a whole lot better than stick. I ventured to confirm.
“So I’m not, er, contractually bound to join up?”
Ai’s turn. “No, absolutely not. We would never. For guarantee—once your paperwork goes through, you’ll go on the…” She needed a moment to make sure the translation was correct. “National Flamebearer Register? After that, the Vaetna will definitely know you’re here; they might send somebody to check on you, because of how you got here.”
She muttered something about “Hina-san” after that, so perhaps that situation would wind up being fraught. Still, it was good to hear—if it came to that, I could probably leave regardless of any obstructions Todai tried to put between me and the Spire. In that sense, I wasn’t a prisoner.
“Um. I still need to think about it.”
One more major concern; Ebi had recommended I ask.
“If I do stay…what would I…do? Do I have to become a Radiance?”
I still wasn’t sure what that even entailed, and there was no way I was bringing up the trans theory—way, way too invasive. Ai looked genuinely confused as it was. “Why would you?”
“Er—Sapphire said I wouldn’t be the first male one.”
Ai actually put her face in her hands at that.“That’s—ugh. She’s so—” she collapsed into Japanese for a moment, mostly directed at Ebi, who rubbed her shoulders and set about redoing her ponytail. “—classified. It’s classified. No, you don’t have to join. I’m sorry if Hina-san made that unclear.”
“Alright. That’s—a relief.” I could live with not thinking about that mysterious offer, although I didn’t miss how she seemed to know exactly what was up where Ebi didn’t. “So I’d just…do research? With you and the others?”
“Yes. To be honest, we haven’t quite thought that far ahead, but it would be something like that. There’s definitely a place for you here. You could do a lot of good with us.”
She said it almost thoughtfully. It was so gratifying to be acknowledged, for my talents to be recognized by someone I felt was an equal. I tried to put it into words.
“Thanks. Um—” I tried again. “This is—what I’ve always…wanted…”
I trailed off into a mumble, because it wasn’t exactly true; I wished I was at the Spire instead. At least I had enough tact to not say that out loud. As it was, this was the next best thing and surely better than being in the clutches of the PCTF, for all Hina had apparently taken it upon herself to stalk me. That element was unnerving—doubly so for the faint thrill it inspired in me.
We once again were left in an awkward lurch where neither of us really knew how to end the conversation. Ai rubbed her wrist and looked down at the spell circle; my eyes ventured up to look at the nest of tentacular grippers stowed against the ceiling. Ebi rescued us.
“Well, if that’s all—I’m taking him back up. You should come with. Get out of your labs.”
Ai waved her creation off, already fiddling with something on her mobile workstation—it had apparently crossed the hall with her. “I want to get the stabilizer done tonight. I’ll try to be up for dinner, but…”
They did a little more back-and-forth in Japanese. Even without translation, the meaning was clear: the workaholic Radiance was committed to whatever project she was currently working on for now and would probably miss dinner. I had been guilty of the same many, many times. Eventually, Ebi sighed and turned to me, jerking her head at the door.
“She’s incorrigible, you know. Let’s go.”
—
The hallway was a bit of a wreck. Never a dull moment, so far.
The walls were gouged, scorched, and outright smashed in a few places. There were already a bunch of people in hi-vis with clipboards and measuring tapes marking what needed repair or replacement; good thing they were right next to Ai’s workshop. Opal and Amethyst had gone, but—Sapphire was still here. She looked decidedly ruffled, though not injured, and had evidently been waiting for me. The puppy’s metaphorical tail was decidedly not between her legs despite the tongue-lashing I had overheard. She bounced toward me. At least she wasn’t obviously in predator-mode—I still had the urge to call for Ai, suppressed only by residual awkwardness and a rather silly desire to not make a scene.
“Hey, Ez!”
I flinched internally. She didn’t have the right to call me that. Ebi physically interposed herself between myself and the Radiance. “Sapphire. Leave my patient alone.”
She stopped, pouting. “I didn’t mean to scare him!”
Both of us stared at her. After a moment, she flinched under the pressure. “Okay, I did, but—no hard feelings, right? You’re still staying?”
“I—you didn’t make it sound like I had much choice.”
She actually looked almost guilty at that, but recovered quickly. “Mm. We did sorta maybe a little bit kidnap you—but this is where you should be! Look at you! You’re so…good at glyphs! Alice really wants you here.”
Alice being…Opal, right. I found my voice, encouraged by the confirmation from Ai. “I’m—not—” come on, spit it out, I can do it—“becoming a Radiance.”
She took that with a surprising amount of equanimity. A worrying amount, frankly. She waved her hand. “Yeah, yeah. You’ll come around. I haven’t even made my pitch yet!”
The wind of defiance left my sails. She was still warming up? Ebi’s voice was dry. “He’s not going to stay at all if you keep pushing him.”
Hina entirely ignored that. Her eyes alighted on my arm. “Hey, she redid the binding. Nice color! Way cleaner lattice, too! No more blood?”
I shook my head, the motion jerky with the tension of fear. Her shoulders slumped.
“Aw.”
The robot shooed her with both hands. “Get out of here. Shoo. Begone. Don’t make me get the spray bottle. Or the cold iron.”
Sorry, the what? What the hell was she? I assumed that was a joke—stowed it for later. My thoughts turned instead to the connection I had made earlier. I had resolved to put a bit more stock in her character, as hard as she was making it right now. She had pushed me to get the binding—I attempted to muster my courage again, leaning around Ebi to make…well, not quite eye contact with Hina. Her eyes were too blue. I wound up looking at her chest, then lips, then gave up and just looked up at a space over her head where a wrecked light fixture was sparking a bit.
“You helped her.”
“Hm?”
“Ai. My spear.”
Not the most eloquent, but in my defense, it was a hard thing to say. I was far outside my comfort zone with this kind of comment. Thankfully, she got the message—and was surprised, fixing her hair a bit. Maybe she hadn’t been expecting me to pick up on that?
“Um. She’s just…barely been sleeping, and nothing really helps unless she’s working with Amane, so I figured…”
“Didn’t tell her.”
I’m not entirely sure why I said that—but it was somehow the right thing to say, and she smiled at me. I’d have liked to smile back, if only I wasn’t so overwhelmed by the strange moment. Nonetheless, some kind of understanding passed between us, a camaraderie in subterfuge, helping people behind their backs. This puppy-hyena—or fairy, according to Ebi?—had layers. So did I, maybe. Ai had said we were alike—maybe that wasn’t such a bad thing? Well—no, that was entirely a bridge too far, she still evoked a primal terror in me that set my heart pounding and made me tense with the need to defend myself, but…there was something there, undeniably. Ebi reminded us she was still here.
“I appreciate it too, if that counts for anything.”
The moment should have broken—and perhaps it did, but those sapphire pools remained staring right at me even as she replied. “Yeah, but that’s just how you are! Ezzen’s an unknown!”
I flinched again at the use of my online name in person. She’d used it before, when we first met—I’d had higher priorities at the time. Now I had the wherewithal to realize how much it bothered me, especially considering how, coming from Ai, it hadn’t. The name was a compartmentalisation between the shell of who I had been before magic had come to the world and the magic-obsessed teenager I had become since…but I had never been brave enough to take it outside the digital, and it felt like a bit of a violation for her to have made that decision for me. Yet I still couldn’t bring myself to object.
Ebi said something in Japanese, and Hina tittered back at her, but the hyena’s eyes remained locked on me. Savoring my discomfort? I felt like a piece of meat; the kinship had vanished utterly. Ebi made to shoo her away again—
She moved past the robot in a way that made no sense—
She was in my face. Her finger traced down my chest, her voice a playful whisper in my ear.
“It’s a real choice, you know.”
She smelled good. Then she winked at me and bounced down the hall, past the repairmen who had momentarily stopped working to observe the exchange. She turned back once as she reached the end of the hall.
“I’m going out. Don’t want curry. Back before midnight to help with Ai’s thing.”
Space folded wrong, twisting with a bang-crunch as the air protested the distortion. She vanished. Only then did Ebi move from her protective position.
“Can she—”
“Yes.”
That exit didn’t have as much impact on me as it probably should have, because I was staring down at the prosthetic. Then at the tattoo, then my old burns, then at where Hina had been standing. I knew she didn’t mean whether to stay at Lighthouse, or whether to become a Radiance.
I pulled out my phone.
ezzen: Sapphire keeps calling me Ezzen.
ezzen: Instead of my actual name.
ezzen: And I don’t know how to feel about it.
_twilitt: :ooo
ezzen: She also teleported but one thing at a time.
_twilitt: thats big for you isnt it
_twilitt: hows it feel
starstar97: lmfao yeah she does that
starstar97: but holy shit e that rocks
ezzen: Good?
ezzen: Bad coming from her specifically?
ezzen: Like it feels like it should be good but
skychicken: my fault
skychicken: sorry for leaking
I wasn’t sure how upset to be. Star chose for me.
starstar97: sky??
starstar97: what the hell?
skychicken: circumstances demanded it
skychicken: ez was in danger, saph wouldnt have gone out of her way for a random flamebearer outside of japan unless i told her that she was rescuing “ezzen from the forums”
skychicken: otherwise she would have let the vaetna sort it out
ezzen: ??? and why didn’t you let them?
ezzen: Why send me here?
skychicken: because i didn’t know!
skychicken: im not omniscient, believe it or not
skychicken: i didn’t know whether the vaetna would make it to you in time, and I didn’t know how well you’d succeed at stalling, or any of that
skychicken: i just knew my friend was in danger and called in the favor i could
skychicken: i didn’t ask sapphire to abduct you
I had known skychicken for years, practically since the forums’ inception. But I couldn’t quite bring myself to believe him. It was all too convenient, especially given Ebi’s avoidance earlier.
ebi-furai: i want to ditto this
starstar97: wait
ebi-furai: lighthouse really had no clue what was going on until saph brought you back
starstar97: “ABDUCT”?????????
ezzen: So I had the chance to go to the Spire
ezzen: Which you KNOW is all I’ve ever fucking WANTED
_twilitt: ez…
ezzen: And you grabbed the craziest VNT you could find and had her abduct me to the other side of the planet for
skychicken: you’d rather be dead?
And—that was the rub, wasn’t it? My suspicions were baseless; he couldn’t have known, he wasn’t—I didn’t have the right to be angry.
skychicken: im sorry, ez.
skychicken: i wish i could have called the spire. its where you should be
ezzen: Yeah I’m uh
ezzen: Need a bit of a break. Gonna lurk
starstar97: 🙁
skychicken: sorry
ebi-furai: i realize this sorta casts me in a suspicious light
starstar97: e inviting you is kinda a legit point in favor of the whole situation i think
starstar97: unless it was coerced but like. cmon. its lighthouse
_twilitt: ezzen is okay! id take that over the alternative
“Pretty fucked up, huh.”
I didn’t respond, just watched the chat scroll.
starstar97: okay, topic change bc thats all really fuckin bleh
starstar97: ebi your english is really good
skychicken: yeah
skychicken: very chatroom fluent, feels like
ebi-furai: well my mom speaks it so i grew up with it
ebi-furai: im a bit following your leads on syntax here
It was sort of impressive how she was passing off her undoubtedly weird childhood as that of a human. Like me, she seemed more comfortable being genuine online—but then, she was a machine. I didn’t have an excuse. We entered the elevator.
I shouldn’t have exploded at Sky. I did owe him—possibly my life, certainly my freedom. But something was still just rubbing me the wrong way about the whole thing. How had he known? It felt ridiculous to accuse my friend of some kind of…what, conspiracy? I didn’t even know how to categorize it, but there were threads here I couldn’t see, and it bothered me. I resolved to at least apologize to him later, once I had cooled down more. The lights above the elevator’s door ticked up and up, 16, 17—we passed the 18th floor and kept going.
“Wait, where are we headed?”
“Your room. Opal’s gonna make her pitch.”
“Opal?”
I had thought we were seeing Amethyst. She just grinned at me. Great, another Radiance. I could only hope she was an Ai and not a Hina—either way, I’d probably manage to make it awkward, but that was beyond my control.
The elevator stopped.
The 19th floor—and the 20th, apparently—had been converted to one enormous penthouse apartment. A set of stairs to the second level were to our right. There was a large kitchen, the island covered in scattered mostly empty dishes. Beanbag chairs and controllers were scattered around a large TV with a PS5 sitting on the cabinet below it. By the window sat an easel with a half-complete painting of the skyline. Over on the right of the common space was a glass wall with the Lighthouse symbol on it. A large round table lay within, bearing an intimidating landscape of paperwork and flanked by whiteboards crammed with Japanese characters. Most strikingly, I could see another room adjacent to it that looked like a dojo.
I had seen this cavernous common space in a few videos—I snapped a pic and sent it to Star. Seeing this would probably kill her. The square footage…it was too big to eyeball reliably. 30,000? 40,000? It was honestly an impractical amount of space for five people, no matter how important or busy. My phone began to buzz angrily.
“I’m. Uh. Living with them?”
A voice came from behind us. “That’s the intent.”
I twisted to look. Where the space before us had no second level, the area behind me did. The stairs led up to a glass-and-metal balcony that went from one wall until it met the elevator shaft that was the building’s spine, a great rectangular block in the center which disrupted the otherwise-open floor plan on both levels. Leaning over the balcony’s railing was Radiance Opal.
She was easily the most visually striking of the five in her human form, despite Amethyst’s prostheses. For one, her hair was white, pearlescent, and styled in a short bob cut. She was dressed in a way my fashion-unacquainted mind was hesitantly calling “athleisure,” not much more than a black sports bra, unzipped white jacket, and leggings. She had a distinctly half-something look to her features, not fully Japanese—Brazilian? Star would know. She had a faintly English accent, more London than mine.
What really set her apart, though, was the tail. It was a sinuous, reptilian appendage, huge and as thick as her torso, almost as long as her legs. It was adorned with white scales that glimmered like her hair as she trotted down the stairs, weightless as Hina or Ebi. Her slitted eyes were another hint of her nature, red with brilliant oranges glimmering within like a fire opal, a sunset caught in amber. Her real name was Alice Takehara, and she was Todai’s dragon.
She embodied both aspects that gave the Frozen Flame its name. She was literally hot, prone to destructive one-offs more reminiscent of blood magic than woven spellcraft. Like the rest of us Flamebearers, she was a nuclear weapon stitched to a person—but one applied with all the precision of a scalpel, famously calculating and cool under pressure. As a result, she was—ostensibly—the leader of the team. In practice, she shared the role with Sapphire, being more the organizational head where Hina thrived taking point on the ground. In my Vaetna-based conceptualization of these things, that made her the Sani to Hina’s Heung. She stopped in front of us with a half-bow and a smile.
I blinked. Dalton was a nobody. It wasn’t the name that really belonged in this world of magic, the name behind a fair chunk of the modern magical theory that was available to the public.
“Ezzen.”
“Ah. Your online name?”
“Um. Yeah. Could—could you call me that instead?”
Uncharacteristically bold of me—Hina was rubbing off on me, maybe. That conjured the idea of her rubbing—nope. Why, brain? None of that, especially not in front of her teammate. I attempted to refocus on Opal, who acquiesced to the request without missing a beat, sticking her hand out.
“Of course. Ezzen-san, youkoso, Toudai e.”
I shook it. It was a firm, practiced handshake, a result of probably thousands of meetings with various officials and fans. I scrambled for a bit of Japanese that Star had attempted to teach me last year. Really should have practiced this, in hindsight. “Um—yoroshiku onegaishamisu?”
Ebi grinned. “Close. Yoroshiku onegaishimasu.”
It occurred to me that she definitely could have given me a crash course on the greeting protocol on the way up rather than letting me humiliate myself. Opal took her hand back, bowed her head, and said the phrase herself, seemingly satisfied with my attempt. I looked around the cavernous space again, blushing at my fumble. It occurred to me to put away my phone. That was the polite thing to do, right?
“Sorry, why am I here exactly?”
Ebi took on a mock-doctorly tone. “Cohabitation is proven to enhance team cohesion.”
Opal bowed again, this time a formal, straight-backed motion much more serious than Hina’s dip of the head earlier.
“I’m—very sorry for Sapphire’s behavior. It was a terrible first impression, and I believe it has fundamentally misrepresented the nature of your presence here and what we’re offering you.”
Ebi cut in. “She apologized to us directly.”
I looked up at her. Had she? Ebi’s head bounced a bit, acknowledging that Hina really hadn’t. However, she had given me something in that conversation. I was still working out how grateful I should be. Opal saw the exchange.
“My point exactly. This was…a kidnapping, yes. I want to be as up-front as possible about that. That’s no way for a magical girl to behave, and it’d be a stain on our reputation if that went public. And if the Vaetna come knocking, that puts us in a tough spot, so we do have an interest in at least keeping you happy and healthy. Not a prisoner.”
I thought I heard something like a rumble under her voice. Was she like Hina after all? Ai had intimated as much in our first conversation. She went on.
“That being said…Toudai is actively looking to recruit, and you’re quite the catch, the circumstances of how you got here aside. I understand you’d prefer to be at the Spire instead?”
“Um—yeah.” It was too embarrassing to say out loud that I wished to be a Vaetna; it felt almost childlike against her professionalism, exacerbating the asymmetry I already felt with me bedridden versus her on her feet. “But I know they’re not recruiting, so it’d just be a research role, and you’re offering me the Radiance thing instead—which I’m not really sure about—and the replacement for my foot means I should stay here for a while anyway and…”
I trailed off lamely. I had been chewing on this series of facts all day. I pulled out my phone again almost reflexively, responding to Star’s jealousy with some obligatory smugness that I wasn’t really feeling at all. Opal’s response was a bit uncertain.
“Um—yes.”
I seemed to have ruined her script. Oops. She found her footing again after a moment.
“The Spire would give you sanctuary, but not a future. I hate to sell us as the second-best, but we are indeed second-best, and we could make something of you in a way the Spire would not. That’s your carrot. But—we don’t want to rush you, and ideally we’d like you to be fully recovered before asking you to commit or not. I understand this living situation might feel like it runs counter to that, but this would be best for both your recovery and your training…”
I looked up as she trailed off. She looked uncomfortable—she thought I wasn’t paying attention, staring at my phone as I was. Damn it. I put it away again.
“Uh, sorry. I can, uh…I don’t know about living…here. It’s a lot.”
She seemed rather thoroughly off-track by now, but forged ahead.
“It is a lot, and I’m sorry we’re putting the decision on you now. What are your concerns?”
“You’re…all girls.”
I felt a little stupid saying it loud, but after Hina, I had to. I was terrified of the prospect of sharing a space with five gorgeous women.
“Is that a problem? You’d have your own room and bathroom, so you’d have privacy. We’re good roommates, I promise.”
Was that a joke? I couldn’t tell. “I mean—that’s good. But I really meant that, uh, Sapphire said…”
How was I to explain the discomfort she made me feel, or the implication that I could eventually become one of them? I had already internally decided against becoming a Radiance, and told Hina as much—but with this living situation, it felt like there was almost a threat of…I didn’t know how to categorize it. Osmosis?
I heard it again, a rumbling noise. I initially thought it might have been construction—but as she sighed with exasperation, it occurred to me that I might be somehow detecting traces of her mantle, her frustration manifest in her magic.
“I’m sorry about Hina, again. She’s made a real mess of this. She can be made to respect boundaries, I promise.”
That didn’t quite convince my latent prey instincts that the danger had passed, but it was nonetheless relieving to hear. “Um—good. You’re all okay with having me here?”
I wasn’t actually sure what I had meant to imply about myself by saying that, if anything—Opal just nodded.
“No objections from us. Hina is…well, too eager to have you here, maybe, but we’ll work on that—but otherwise it’s a good arrangement, I think. You need language practice, and immersion is great for that.”
It hadn’t actually quite hit me that I was in Japan now—everyone so far had spoken essentially fluent English. She went on.
“I’m told that proximity to Ebi and Ai is also a must for your recovery, so it’s here or the 18th floor for now.”
That made the decision for me. Go back to that desolate, lonely maze of empty rooms? Absolutely not. Sure, it would be a change—but this was a ludicrously nice living space.
“I—sure. Okay.”
She nodded understandingly.
“Once your recovery has progressed a bit further, if it doesn’t feel like it’d work out, it’d be easy enough to transfer—”
The rumbling’s origin made itself apparent. The Radiance reddened.
“Opal.” Ebi finally spoke up. “How long has it been since you had a real meal?”
She replied in Japanese, and I heard something whiny in her voice, a sharp contrast from the crisp and level way she had been speaking to me. They argued back and forth for a moment. Eventually, Ebi turned to me.
“We’re going to your room. Opal will catch up once she’s eaten something.”
Opal protested again in Japanese—then switched to English, carrying that whine with her. “I’ll just—”
She almost stomped over to the kitchen, tail lashing. I supposed that Ebi would be the supreme authority among the six when it came to their health. The robot stage-whispered to me.
“She doesn’t eat as much as she should.”
On account of the tail, I had to assume. Opal barked back at us as she rummaged through the fridge.
“I can hear you!”
Or at least that’s what she probably said. She asked something after that, and Ebi replied with what I was coming to recognize as “yeah” or similar. Then she returned, bearing what I recognized to be some sort of rice ball. Actually, two. She offered it to me—I assumed that’s what she had asked Ebi. I wasn’t that hungry, and was going to wave it off, but the doctor-bot plucked it from her grasp and handed it to me.
“You’ve been under eightfold healing for seventeen hours. You could use the calories.”
Fair enough. I wasn’t sure how to free it from the plastic wrapper—Ebi visibly suppressed a sigh and took it back. Her suite of emotional displays was really quite thorough.
“Watch.”
She undid the wrapper with precision, a multi-step process involving peeling back one strip of plastic and then pulling the corners of the triangle apart. I peered at the onigiri freed from its multilayered sheath of plastic.
“Seems involved.”
“Keeps the seaweed dry.”
Opal, for her part, had already inhaled half of hers, tail waving with what I took to be satisfaction, or embarrassment. It was adorable—and decidedly unlike the professionalism she had exuded just a minute prior. Maybe she was a Hina, but just the puppy? That was optimistic. I bit into my own snack and got only rice and a bit of seaweed. Weren’t these supposed to have fillings? I showed it to Ebi.
“A little deeper. This one is pickled plum. You’ll know it when you get to it.”
I took another bite—ah. There it was, surprisingly juicy and crunchy. The sourness was refreshing, but I wasn’t sure I’d have picked this flavor, given the choice. Nevertheless, my empathy insisted that the obviously-ravenous-and-embarrassed-about-it Radiance not be the only one eating, so I kept going. It was edible, at least, and Ebi seemed to approve of us meat-beings getting our requisite nutrition. She glanced at Opal.
“You really should have just talked to him over tea and snacks. You could have avoided this whole thing.”
Opal turned bright red. She was hilariously framed: her pearl hair gave her flushed face a striking resemblance to the Japanese flag visible behind her in the meeting room, and over her other shoulder was the Todai symbol on the glass as though labeling her—it took everything in my power to not start laughing with a mouthful of rice. She didn’t dignify it with a response and just kept eating, although the tip of her tail snapped against the tile floor once, a surprisingly resonant sound, like tapping the edge of a glass with a fork. Were her scales gems? They certainly looked like it.
A matching ringing noise resounded from upstairs. Opal’s tail clicked a few more times, and she got a few more responses. Then I heard footsteps on the stairs and turned to look.
Amethyst’s mantle was, in a word, mecha. Where the other girls’ mantles were more or less their own bodies in impractical-looking ribbons and fancy hairdos, hers was enormous, crystalline and faceted, standing three meters tall. Her legs were like bony stalactites, although with digitigrade geometry impossible for any such rock formation. The skeletal resemblance continued to her torso, which looked a bit more humanoid, calling to mind a Gundam or an EVA unit, although my familiarity with mecha was no better than my knowledge of magical girls. I was well and truly out of my genre.
Her head was small for the frame of her body, a long forward-facing spike with outgrowths radiating along the sides to a V-point. A pair of additional spikes—maybe ‘blades’ was more accurate—flared out from the sides, recalling fins. It was thoroughly inhuman, faceless and mechanized.
She retained some of the magical girl elements that unified all their mantles despite the physical differences, like the shoulder-ribbons and embellishments at the knees and elbows that matched the trim on the others’ uniforms. But she certainly wasn’t an anime girl—though her proportions did hint at femininity, even ‘monstergirl’ was inadequate. She really did resemble a mecha made of crystal more than anything else. The marketing and merch tended to make her look a bit—no, a lot more humanoid.
She had a kind of grace, like her more humanoid counterparts, but exacerbated by her departure from flesh. The gems almost flowed as she moved, only crystallizing when she stood still. It reminded me of the Spire’s dermis, oddly nostalgic and familiar. It was most visible in her arms—too long and reinforced at the joints—as she gesticulated, her fingers seeming like at any moment they could splash off into little flowing droplets. It belied the fact that she was, as far as anybody knew, completely invincible, a stark contrast against the sickly and pared-away meat of her real body. According to the rumors, she had suffered grievous injuries in PCTF captivity and during her subsequent escape. The facts were that those injuries, whatever their origin, didn’t bother her as long as she was mantled.
She almost warbled a greeting to Ebi before turning to me. Those ringing sounds had been her voice, apparently.
“Hello. Nice—to meet you.”
Oh. She barely spoke English? I could at least match that.
“Yoroshiku onegaishimasu?” I said it right this time.
A rush of wind, a burst of motion—and suddenly she was in my face, looming over me, chattering excitedly in ringing tones. I flinched at how quickly she had moved; Vaetna-like, again, but the effect was far more visceral in person, and she was a whole lot bigger than Hina and just as inhuman. At least the intimidation of her size was undercut by the way her voice sounded like wind chimes, but that had still been a momentary reminder of how scary the Radiances could be purely as a function of being mantled. Ebi almost hauled her off of me, barely half her height, presumably explaining the language barrier. Amethyst didn’t have facial expressions per se, but she did slump a bit as she replied. Ebi translated.
“She’s really happy to meet you, and—‘your escape was so cool. How’s your foot?’”
Ebi knew exactly how good my foot was, but I supposed Amethyst wanted to hear it from me. “It’s…good.” Come on, Ez, a bit more. “Ai’s work is—incredible.” That came from the heart, at least.
Amethyst nodded excitedly at that once Ebi translated. Opal had finished eating and cut in as she walked over to her teammate. “She’s a big fan of yours.”
Oh, right, I had almost forgotten. New additions to the chatroom or people getting excited when I showed up in YouTube comments were one thing, now familiar, but I had discovered with the guy in the hallway that I really didn’t know how to do this in person. The language barrier wasn’t helping.
“Um, please tell her that I think her mantle is…cool. I don’t, um, know much about mecha, but I like how it moves.”
Opal translated, and Amethyst rang back at her, clapping excitedly. She was bouncier than Hina, and also moved in a way that was too lightweight for her size, but since she was so much bigger, everything she did came off as a bit looming.
“You have no idea how much that means to her. A lot of the design came from your research on LM. Specifically your paper on—ripple divergence in third-order chains? She used that to cut down on her mantle ripple by a lot.”
What did I say? “You’re welcome?” I was a bit paralyzed; it felt sort of wrong that my research was actually being used by big-name VNTs. Especially when said research was now out of date. I started to almost mumble to myself, having pulled out my phone once more. I’d really have to kick that habit. On top of that, the dermis connection was making me ramble a bit.
“I—er, need to revise that. If you’re using an orange link there, Bri said on stream today—uh, yesterday—that the first-gen displays didn’t play well with high ripple, because of orange third. My guess is that the specific problem was with {MANIFEST}, and they switched to blue for second-gen because it’s so much better for indicating LM ripple even though it’s worse for almost everything else at super-3. So since your transformations are LM, you’d probably get better reduction with the same trick? But these days they’re using pink third, and I don’t know if that’s specifically for the Spire’s internals since they don’t care as much about LM ripple compared to other types these days or—”
I stopped when Ebi poked my cheek. “Save it for Ai. Amethyst isn’t getting a word of this.”
I had again completely forgotten about the language barrier—but now I wasn’t about to let that stop me. I surveyed the huge space around us, looking for somewhere to write.
“I need a whiteboard.”
—
That’s how we ended up in the meeting room, diagramming third-order spell chains. Ebi had helped me limp from my bed to a chair, actually nominally Amethyst’s for when she was out of mantle, which meant that it was both exceedingly comfortable and had a few nice features that let me maneuver around the room, almost a wheelchair. She had then disappeared to retrieve my actual wheelchair from upstairs—that had been intended for later—and again to get proper dinner once it became clear that we’d be here a while.
The whiteboard markers were magic, with full color-selection like the tattoo gun earlier, which helped me get across my point about the color coding. I had actually taken one apart to figure out the glyphs, peering at the substrates; just {DIFFERENTIATE}-{REFRACT}, as expected, but the form factor for the physical glyph that the magic had been woven around was impressively miniaturized. It was actually relevant to the conversation, too, because the very lattice displays in question were fundamentally one of a few permutations on a similar template. The color order and selection we had been discussing was a shorthand for tension within the weave to modulate different ripples, rather than intrinsic properties of the glyphs themselves. Because that color-coding was universal, Amethyst had no problem following along.
It was incredible how complete of a conversation about high-level magical theory we were managing to have through symbology, although occasionally Opal would have to translate. Amethyst picked up what I had been trying to explain pretty fast once I started drawing. A lot of the terms like LM were borrowed directly from English in Japanese, and I was getting a crash course myself in some of the ones that weren’t: ripple, for instance, was hibiki, 響き. The concept was slightly different between the languages; it meant ‘echo’ rather than ripple. High ripple was therefore koukyou, 高響, low ripple was teikyou, 低響, and so on. Ebi said not to worry about being able to write the kanji for now, although I figured that if my memory for them was half as good as it was for glyphs, I’d probably get the hang of it fast.
Opal was mostly content to sit back and let us work. She would occasionally cut in with an insight of her own, but seemed to be enjoying my engagement with her rock-mecha teammate. She was visibly delighted when Ebi returned with two trays of food, effortlessly balancing them like a veteran waitress. The robot distributed dishes with some comments to the Radiances before turning to me. I inspected the contents of my bowl, my pair of training chopsticks and a spoon already resting at the sauce’s edge as though soaking in a hot spring.
“Curry?”
“Yeah. Sauce, rice, some stewed beef, veggies. The fried thing is a chicken cutlet.”
“I know. I’m, uh, not good with spice.”
Opal actually laughed at that through a mouthful of noodles. “It’s Japan-spicy, you’ll be fine.”
Said noodles were too thick to be ramen, and her soup bore a remarkable resemblance to the curry in front of me, other than the viscosity. The bowl was impressively big. She pointed at it with her chopsticks in response to my inquisitive glance.
“Curry udon.”
She also had some fried bits, although they were on the side. She was evidently in her happy place, apparently unashamed about the quantity she was eating now that she had dispensed with the professional airs. Next to her, Amethyst had something similar, minus the noodles and in a smaller portion, but it wasn’t clear how the giant rock-woman would eat—
Until she dropped her mantle. The crystalline, faceted forms of the mecha folded in on themselves, sort of rotating like Ebi’s hand had earlier, and the air hissed as it rushed to fill the now-vacant space. Then there was a whump as Amethyst’s true body popped out of wherever it had been…stored, presumably. The actual mechanism was a well-kept secret, though I had my suspicions and educated guesses.
Amane Ishikawa’s hair was brown, although darker than the borderline-red of Hina’s, and fell in a straight, well-maintained curtain all around her head. Star had once explained that it was something of a point of pride for her, described in interviews as a reminder that she was still a magical girl, for all the time she spent with a construct for a body. She wasn’t nearly as tall as her mantled form, of course, but she was still the tallest Radiance by a noticeable margin—although that wasn’t saying much, as the team as a whole skewed short; I still had an inch on her. She was wearing earrings, something pale that might have been pearl—or opal. Freckles were splattered across her face, interrupted on her right side by faint crisscrossed scars coming up from her cheek, some wrapping around to her temple where others disappeared under the eyepatch covering that side.
The first thing she did was emit a choking gasp, achingly familiar. Ebi was by her side, soothing and seemingly applying some kind of analgesic. Opal held her right hand, her flesh one, but I could still see how the taller woman was trembling. She took a few deep breaths and seemed to steady herself, then her eyes flicked to me. Or rather, her eye did. Her left eye was whole, a vivid green on par with Hina’s blue that made me entertain the idea that she should have been Emerald. After a moment, the patch covering her right lit up. It was a digital screen like Ebi’s face, and the projected ‘eye’ moved in sync with her physical one. It wasn’t quite seamless and didn’t sell the illusion of being the real thing, the way a sufficiently intricate LM construct might. I was sure she owned fancier ones for outside the comfort of her home—since like Hina’s teeth or the bags under Ai’s eyes, my memory of Amane’s face was unblemished in videos and even live streams, sanitized of her mortality.
In person, her pain was apparent. Even through whatever painkillers Ebi had applied, her jaw was clenched and her shoulders were hunched, visible through the well-practiced smile of greeting she turned on me. It made my heart hurt, remembering the long months of recovery from the first time everything had changed for me, seven years prior. And she had it worse than me, by all accounts: even if I were to include my hand’s burns, my blood prices paled in comparison to what I knew of her injuries, though couldn’t see most of it here due to the baggy hoodie she wore and her legs being hidden under the table. The only sign other than the eye was her free hand emerging from the sleeve, an intricate white-and-purple construct that moved like flesh, holding the spoon. Ai’s masterwork, self-animated by Amane’s own lattices. The resemblances to Ebi’s own chassis were obvious, but this looked even more high-tech.
I spoke without thinking. “Are you alright?”
That was a stupid question, of course, since the answer was both yes and no. No, since she was clearly in pain—yes, because it was familiar pain, a simple fact of her life for years now. Ebi glared at me a little, but the way Opal’s eyes flicked to me without reprimand suggested that the empathy was what counted. Amane herself nodded and gave me a thumbs-up with the prosthetic hand—some things transcended language—squeezed her eyes shut, and took a deep breath. Then she reopened her eyes and began to eat. Ebi left her side after a moment, but Opal kept holding her other hand, the flesh one, as they ate. I got the sense that this was something of a ritual for the three, or perhaps the team as a whole. My phone buzzed.
ebi-furai: amethyst can take care of herself
ebi-furai: be respectful, shes not made of glass
ezzen: gotcha, sorry
I understood; I figured Opal holding her hand was an exception. I looked down at my own hand under the table, examining the familiar patchwork of scarring, moving the fingers. I had mostly full mobility, since they had spared no expense in the wake of such a horrible and tragic disaster, an entire year of skin grafts and cutting-edge treatments aided by magic still in its infancy. “Nobody should have to go through that, what a nightmare, how was I holding up”—I had long since become inured to the well-wishes. Sometimes, horrible things just happen, and the scars aren’t symbols of bravery or valor, just pain.
In light of that—what could I do to “be respectful” here, given the language barrier? There was only one thing that readily came to mind, the only thing I was really good at. I stood, returning to the whiteboard. Amethyst had drawn out a decent portion of her mantle’s lattice for me, although much of it was shorthand and getting all the details would need me to actually boot up the program on my laptop to properly keep track of everything. But this was my comfort zone, my one real talent, and so I had been able to tabulate ripple values on-the-fly with formulas I knew by heart as we sketched different configurations. I picked up a smaller whiteboard leaning against the main one’s ledge. I could tell there was a lattice in it, and just from feel and context—
“This what I think it is?”
“Yes, just tug.”
I did—magically, not physically—and the larger board’s contents copied themselves onto the smaller one. I brought it over, putting it between us on the table. I began to draw in a new chunk, {ICE}-{TRANSPOSE}, linked in orange to the main {MANIFEST} chunk, on the high-pulse side. I drew in a little stick figure version of Amethyst and circled the legs, then put a big question mark next to it. My gut was telling me the resemblance to the Spire’s skin was more than superficial.
Opal caught my eye as I passed the marker to Amane, and nodded. I took that as a sign that this was the right way to treat her, based on what Ebi had said. Amane’s good arm—the mechanical one—grabbed the marker, and she gave my addition a once-over, before going over my question mark with a check mark, confirming my guess. It didn’t tremble the way her flesh-arm did. Then she wrote something in kanji next to it, reading the label aloud.
“Karada no ugoki.”
Her voice was tight with pain, but controlled. She passed the marker to Opal, who labeled the chunk with “BODY MOVEMENT.” Then Amane switched the marker to blue and drew over the orange connection point and jotted a question mark of her own next to the change before passing it back to me. I nodded and shoveled some more curry into my mouth, having made the executive decision to forego my chopsticks for the spoon. I added a second line parallel to the blue one in pink.
“One of these two. We should really run it in…GWalk? Do you guys use that?”
“Emerald has her own version. But—”
She asked Amane something, who nodded.
“We’ll just test it later. Amane’s intuition is better than the computer.”
That made sense. “I’d love to see the full diagram, but…that’s probably classified?”
Opal nodded. “Very. We’d need you to commit to joining first.”
The two Radiances looked over the whole diagram again.
“When Sapphire first brought you in and said you were the Ezzen, we had our doubts. Nothing against you—it was just hard to verify, and she’s refusing to tell us how she knew. So, full disclosure, this was a test, if more fun and impromptu than I had been expecting. I’m so happy you two are getting along.”
Her thumb rubbed the back of Amane’s hand. I was happy too—didn’t know if I should comment on it. Opal went on.
“This really is top-level stuff. This is hard to do by eye, even for us. And your passion shines. Apologies for making this an interview, but—what got you into magic? Other than your general proclivity for the Vaetna.”
I had been blushing, unused to face-to-face compliments—I sobered. Hadn’t they read my file?
“My father died in the firestorms.”
I saw something flicker across both their faces; they had been flametouched not long after that. That period had been defined by death for all of us, probably. She didn’t offer any condolences; we were all long since past that point.
“And you wanted to—forgive any presumptions—prevent that from happening to somebody else?”
That was part of it, but there was more. I had talked about this many times before online, to friends, but never out loud or publicly. “I wanted to understand. To—make sense of it? The Vaetna proved it’s more than just a natural disaster, that it could be controlled. Glyphs make sense.”
Amane said something to Opal, words I recognised. “Ao hibana mitai.”
Opal squeezed her hand.“How much do you know about the Blue Spark Incident?”
I didn’t follow the leap. “Uh—inferno control. Non-Flamefall source.”
“Do you know how it started?”
“Blood magic that went too far, right? Necromancy.”
“She was a Sun’s Blessing member gone radical. They believe that everyone who died in the firestorms had their souls incorporated into the Frozen Flame. She was trying to get her husband back.”
It hadn’t worked. Something else had come through, and the sky above Tokyo still had the scar to remember it by. Now I understood the accusation.
“I’m—I don’t want to bring my dad back, if that’s what you’re implying. I love glyphs, the Spire, not blood magic.”
Ai’s words rang in my ears. Sacrifice.
“So it has to be the Spire?”
“Well—no, but they get it. The ripple, the flame. It’s so…beautiful.” I knew how that sounded. “And they use it for something that matters. The Spire Stands.”
Both girls nodded at the familiar catchphrase, so iconic it wasn’t embarrassing to say aloud, even for me. It symbolized the will to weave a better world.
“Todai understands that. That’s the calling, in part.”
“The calling?”
“Mahou shoujo. The purpose of being a magical girl. Light in the dark. That matters.”
She said it with a conviction behind her eyes, those gloaming gems as hard as the Spire’s dermis. We understood that about each other, at least.
“That’s to say—this is why we think there’s a place for you here.”
She leaned forward. Amane doodled something in a free space on the whiteboard.
“We’d love for you to join us. We all see your potential as a Radiance. But—if it’s magic itself you care about? Weaving LM structures, optimizing static glyph chains, ripple management? That’s the basis for our magic, for our transformations. You don’t have to join the team for us to see the value in teaching you those, not with your skillset. I’m happy to leave that optional if it’ll get you on board. There’s plenty of time for you to change your mind.”
Amane showed me the whiteboard. She had drawn the Spire’s symbol and an arrow from it to the spinal component of the diagram of her lattice. The arrow was labeled “LM.” Opal went on, gesturing at the drawing.
“I called us second-best earlier. But when it comes to those aspects? We’re just as good as they are.”
This was the real pitch, divorced from what Hina had said about becoming a Radiance.
“You want to know how it actually works? The way our mantles are woven, the actual mechanics of transformation? You were already on the right track with the diagram.”
Her eyes glittered, and for a moment, Todai’s Dragon looked like her namesake, prideful and regal.
“We reinvented the LM structures of dermis for our transformations, and have only taken them further since. If you join, we’ll show you how.”
And in the end, that was all it took.
“I’m in.”
Author’s Note:
As usual, thanks to the beta readers: Cassiopeia, Maria, Zak, and Softies. You rock.
Join the Discord to discuss the story and hang out with other Sunspot readers!
Join the Patreon to support the story and read chapters three weeks ahead of public!
How had Ebi gained access? I hadn’t invited her—it followed that she had either brute-forced her way in, a classic ‘superintelligent AI’ trope that may or may not apply here…or the simpler explanation: she had already had access, a perpetual lurker. But in that case—invited by whom? Skychicken himself? He had implied Hina had been his contact, not her. Ebi was still a plausible enough connection between him and Todai—but if so, why was she hiding it?
starstar97: whoa
starstar97: new person
starstar97: who invited them
It wouldn’t do to let on that I really had no idea how she had gotten in—I wanted her to be here anyway, so I rolled with it.
ezzen: Me, they work for Todai.
ebi-furai: greetings!
DendriteSpinner: hey, ez making friends, nice
starstar97: NO WAY
Star was the first to put together the obvious.
starstar97: so they know youre you?
ezzen: Yeah.
ezzen: They seem chill about it so far?
ebi-furai: we’re trying to be
ebi-furai: some of the staff in the know are freaking out
She was using an all-lowercase style like Star and Moth, unlike the technically correct capitalisation and punctuation I generally preferred, a holdover from starting out on the forums.
starstar97: yo youre recognized
starstar97: thats a good thing isnt it
ezzen: Hope so!
ezzen: Not sure I can be more of a target really.
ezzen: Ok, I’d be remiss to not give ebi (capitalization?) the chance to ingratiate themself, but first:
ezzen: I’ve been disconnected from the news cycle for like
ezzen: 18 hours? Probably a personal record.
ezzen: So catch me up.
ezzen: Sapphire told me the Spire is at war again?
starstar97: npnp
starstar97: dermis got all ridgey again this morning so it sure looks like it
starstar97: did you hear about the other flamefalls
starstar97: its related
ezzen: nope
ezzen: Just that they happened. Short version?
DendriteSpinner: spire’s saying they’re the other shards that split from yours on heung’s intercept
starstar97: one inferno in poland. kat dealt with it
starstar97: one confirmed in america, ofc pctf got that one
starstar97: last was weird, went back to the trajectory from before it switched. actual splashdown is on one of the oil rigs in the gulf
ezzen: oh shit
Oh shit.
DendriteSpinner: yeah. and ofc spire caged the whole area, peacies didn’t like that, etc
DendriteSpinner: so stalemate, war
starstar97: dubai moment
ezzen: Dubai moment. ffs
ebi-furai: not as ugly as dubai yet, fwiw
ebi-furai: its firmly pctf territory and its just one flamefall
starstar97: oh yeah for sure. could be more of a clusterfuck in a lot of ways
starstar97: i think that just about covers it
starstar97: nobody has any fucking clue what was with your flamefall
starstar97: west-east? wtf
ezzen: Trust me it’s been on my mind
ezzen: Will post about it tonight probably.
ezzen: Ok, good enough for now, ty guys.
ezzen: Make Ebi feel welcome.
DendriteSpinner: welcome!
DendriteSpinner: do you feel welcome
ebi-furai: i think so!
starstar97: todai person huh
starstar97: fav radiance?
ebi-furai: emerald
starstar97: hell yeah
ebi-furai: i work with her though so im biased
DendriteSpinner: youre an engineer?
ebi-furai: medical, actually, amethyst stuff
ebi-furai: i do help with engineering stuff too though
ezzen: They’ve basically been my nurse.
It was better to be vague about her gender in the chat unless she volunteered that information.
starstar97: 灯台ファイト
ebi-furai: 日本人だから灯台好きなわけだわww
starstar97: whoa
starstar97: sorry my japanese isnt that good
skychicken: english only in the chat please
ebi-furai: sorry
ebi-furai: im japanese, so ofc im a lighthouse fan
starstar97: :DDDD
Her body returned with a tray of various dishes on a cart.
“Did I come off as a bit know-it-all with the Dubai comment?”
It took me a moment to associate the chatroom name with the robot in front of me. On top of the fact that she had joined of her own volition—via still-mysterious means—it did seem that she genuinely wanted to fit in. It warmed my heart.
“Uh, I think you’re fine.” Couldn’t be worse than Dendrite. “If you screw up some etiquette, I’ll let you know.”
“Thanks.”
She passed the tray over to my lap, adjusting my bed to help me sit up. A decidedly Japanese spread: rice, miso soup, tea, some anonymous fried bits, a small salad, something that seemed to be pickles, and…
“A milkshake?”
“Fortified. The sugar covers up some of the more…chemical flavors. It’s good for you, I promise.”
Huh. It had been a long time since I’d had a milkshake—or any of this, really. Japanese food was a Dalton-thing, not an Ezzen-thing, a relic of a time from when Dad had been al—around.
Those dark thoughts aside, I noted a problem with the provided utensils—rather, the conspicuous lack thereof.
“Um. Can I have a spoon?”
Ebi grinned. With a flourish, she drew something from nowhere, a sleight of hand that was definitely masking some kind of glyph activation, a pocketspace trick like Heung’s spear. She handed me a pair of chopsticks connected by a piece of plastic. The design bore some grooved extrusions to guide where my fingers were supposed to go. I sighed at the utensil; they were assuming I was a dumb foreigner who didn’t know how to use them. They were half-right.
“Oh, I—I know how, but never bothered to relearn with my…”
I indicated my burned hand. Dad had insisted I learn from a young age, but it was another thing that had been taken from me that day. It had taken me about a year to relearn how to hold a pen, and I had never had an incentive or desire to go back to chopsticks. Ebi shrugged.
“I could get you a spoon if you want. Humor us.”
I got the message—they wanted me to acclimate. I sighed inwardly and accepted the utensil, giving it a closer inspection. Even to my limited appreciation of mundane engineering, the chopsticks were impressive, printed as a single part. A compliant mechanism linked the sticks rather than some kind of hinge or bearing, stylized as Todai’s symbol, a triangle with lines radiating out from the tip—a rather unnecessary bit of design flair. The grooves fit my hand perfectly, comfortable as could be given the somewhat limited range of motion in my palm. The attention to detail was ornate, maybe excessive.
“Did Ai make this?”
“Just now.”
Dang. I snapped a photo of the training chopsticks.
ezzen: Check out what Emerald made for me.
starstar97: this is harassment!
skychicken: timezones say it’s lunchtime for you right?
ezzen: Yep.
I showed them the meal and began to eat. Even with the custom, ergonomic utensil, it took me a few tries to pick up one of the mysterious fried bits and maneuver it into my mouth. It was dense, surprisingly hard to bite through.
“I have no idea what this is.”
“Renkon. Lotus root.”
skychicken: hey that looks pretty good for hospital food
I fell into a rhythm as I began to realize how hungry I was. A bite of fried something, a sip of tea, some rice, a little soup, repeat. It was a rather simple arrangement, not many strong flavors other than salt and the oiliness of the breading, but that absence seemed to accentuate each element. The rice became a welcome respite from the saltiness instead of bland carbohydrate filler. The crunch of the breading balanced with the earthiness of the tea. The most intense flavor was the pickles, which had an acidic bite that fully reset the more rich flavors of the fried food. The milkshake felt out of place—I elected to save it for dessert.
ezzen: It’s okay.
I didn’t want to vocalize my commentary. Dad had taught me about this sort of arrangement, the balance of rice and soup and tea, fat and acid, and its return reminded me of his absence. One of the reasons I had hardly left my room in years was fear of this feeling, this awful nostalgia for a childhood that had been burned away, brought to the surface by so many little things. I wanted to go home—where? The house in Philadelphia? Ashes. My apartment? No going back. It was here or the Spire.
The chatroom scrolled on, not privy to the trauma.
starstar97: it should have been me
starstar97: it should have been me!
starstar97: you better go to all the fuckin restaurants
DendriteSpinner: tourism by proxy
I wasn’t particularly keen on that at the moment, given the bad vibes the meal had dredged up for me. I distracted myself with a question; I had stalled enough about this anyway.
“How did you join?”
“Wow, you really screwed that up. It’s pronounced gochisousama deshita.”
“What?”
“‘Thanks for the food’.”
I sighed. “Thanks for the food. How did you join the chatroom? I didn’t invite you.”
“Secret robot magic.”
I slurped my soup, unimpressed with the non-answer. “Is that magic magic, or do you mean you just hacked your way in?”
“Does it matter?”
“I…suppose not? Academic interest?”
“Not relevant to your recovery, and details about me are classified until you join up.”
Prickly.
ezzen: I’ll think about it.
ezzen: There’s a lot of uhhhh…culture shock going on right now.
ezzen: It’s sort of crazy I’m here, you know? I don’t even speak the language.
“You’ll learn if you stay. The Radiances are too busy to really teach you that part, but we keep in touch with a few schools. Lots of grad students and so on.”
I thought about Sapphire’s offer again, the words both she and Sky had used. I mattered, allegedly, and that meant Todai was willing to throw support at me. Divorced from the fear of being hunted, that was exciting—if undercut somewhat by my general bedridden-ness at the moment and the questionable status of my freedom. I sipped the milkshake. It was topped with a cherry and had swirls in it that tasted fruity, though I couldn’t quite place it. Melon?
“Ai said two weeks for my foot, right?”
Ai’s name and the pronoun ‘I’ were starting to get confusing. How did the honorifics work? Ai-san?
“Two weeks of design, and then probably another week of testing and iteration with your input. But she’s been working on a stopgap solution since midnight. That’ll be done in…a few more hours.”
I checked my phone. It was only about 1 PM, but that still meant—yeah, she didn’t get much sleep. Ebi caught the silent question.
“They’ve all got their vices.”
Another person might not call sleep deprivation a “vice”, but I understood—the passion, losing yourself in tinkering and math until suddenly you realized the sun was starting to come up and you hadn’t eaten in fourteen hours. There were worse vices to have; Ai and I were the same kind of person, and I’d be glad to see her actual design process.
“I’d love to see the diagram.”
“For the temporary one?”
“Yeah.”
“She’ll show you.”
We lapsed back into silence for a while as I finished the milkshake. I wanted to get back on my feet, move around a bit.
“Will I actually be allowed to leave the premises? Once I can walk.”
“Are you going to bolt straight for the Gate?”
I didn’t know. “Doesn’t really matter, does it? You’d catch me anyway.”
She rolled her eyes, a rather exaggerated motion on the digital display that was her face. “Please. The foot is a show of good faith. If you really wanted to go, we wouldn’t stop you.”
So was I a prisoner or not? I was picking up on some misalignment between Hina and the others, in terms of goals—but I wasn’t about to ask that to her face again. I decided to trust in Ai, for the time being, and pray that Sapphire didn’t show up again.
I finished my shake, quietly admiring Ebi as a work of engineering and magic in between watching the chatroom scroll and generally catching up. She was ostensibly naked, for one, covered only in mint-green paneling—carbon fiber? Hard to say—ensheathing a narrow and short frame. Aside from the face, her build was androgynous. She was no busty anime nurse, no curve to her chest or particular wideness of the hips—I averted my gaze nonetheless, reddening. She might not have any visible bits, but surely that qualified as ogling.
She sighed. “Oh, look all you want. I’d wear clothes if I cared.”
I shyly resumed my inspection. The paneling was segmented at joints and along the torso, a fairly standard arrangement of components for the humanoid robots of the day—but she didn’t move like a robot, even a magical one. I wondered again how she was made—but that was clearly a no-go topic, and I was entirely too shy to make a comment, even a neutral one. I settled for looking up one of the Japanese-made models that at least superficially resembled her chassis, angling my phone toward her.
“You’re so much more—fluid than anything I’ve seen before.”
“Thanks.”
She brought up her arm to demonstrate the range of motion. The paneling on her chest moved in an echo of her arm, implying a much more complex and organic arrangement than a simple set of servos embedded in her shoulder joint. There was something odd in the movement aside from that—she wasn’t adjusting the rest of her body to counterbalance, even with the arm fully extended. That weightlessness inspired fascination—and a pang of jealousy, a reminder of what had drawn me to the Vaetna outside of pure love for magic. If I pointed a ripple indicator at her, I bet she’d be a blue-green to match her carapace.
Eventually, I worked up the courage to ask to go further, despite some discomfort with the intimacy of the inspection. She was just so interesting.
“Can—may I see your back?”
I had gotten a glimpse earlier, but as she turned around—that was much more sophisticated. Some of her panels were layered over each other, and she had what were obviously shoulder blades. Her spine was visible as well, a chain of segments embedded into each slice of her midsection and back, a clear imitation of the human form. Now that she was facing away from me, my eyes dared to venture past her neck and inspect her head. It was simple and boxy, dark-grey and smaller than a human cranium, although the neck continued the complexity and flexibility of her spine. No ears or hair to speak of; the only real features aside from the curved front-panel of her face were various stickers and labels indicating cable connection points—and a mark on the back of her head that looked hand-painted. I leaned in for a closer look—she knew what I was looking at and took a few steps backward toward me.
“The characters for my name.”
海老. It was pretty, insofar as I had opinions on these things. I pulled out my phone to google ‘ebi’, confirming the word matched the characters.
“Shrimp?”
“Yep.”
“…Why?”
“Why ‘Ezzen’?”
I figured she knew why; I’d answered the question on the forums countless times. This was the first time I had done so out loud, though, and it took me a moment to order my thoughts.
“It’s the spinal—a super-shorthand of the spinal mesh for {MANIFEST}. E—fork, two Z-axis transitions, fork again, and N is sub-1 from the last Z.”
“Vaetna-phile.”
I didn’t blink at the label; it was accurate. {MANIFEST} was arguably the most important glyph in the entire lexicon to the Vaetna, being the fundamental bit of magic behind the Spire’s dermis and, by extension, their carapace. I supposed it applied to the Radiances just as much, although they had come later and were inherently lesser.
“And you?”
She pointed at the kanji on her cranium—CPU?—again before turning back to me. “That’s your hint.”
Hint? I went back to my phone, going down a small rabbit hole of kanji details for a minute. I didn’t get it—the characters meant ‘sea’ and ‘old’, and I wasn’t sure how either was relevant to her.
“Are the riddles really necessary?”
“It’s a hint, not a riddle.”
“We already established I don’t speak the language.”
She waved a hand lazily. “Eh. You’ll get it eventually.” With that vague foreshadowing, she came over and took the tray of food from my lap. “Going to put these away, and then I’ll be gone for a couple hours. Need anything before I go? Pain okay?”
“Foot’s fine…is it just you up here? Other nurses?”
“What, want to get rid of me already?”
“Er—no, I just meant—”
“Well, it is. Just me, I mean. I’m the doctor.”
I blinked. “You are?”
“I am.”
She hadn’t corrected my earlier misconception that she was my nurse. Maybe she didn’t want to give too much away to the chatroom—which might have been telling, were I inclined to tease apart the possible reasons for those subtleties. I had enough on my plate as it was.
“And you…take care of Amethyst? No support staff?”
That bothered me a bit, since what I knew of Amethyst’s injuries were quite a bit more extensive than even the third-degree burns my hand had suffered. For the duration of my last extended hospital stay, I had had no less than four nurses on rotation in addition to a pair of doctors, and I would have expected something equivalent and relatively full-time care for her. Then again, Ebi probably didn’t have to sleep.
“Well, it’s me and Ai’s tech. Been good enough so far.”
I didn’t pry further than that. I looked around the bed, checking to see if there was anything else I wanted or needed for the moment. “Er—I don’t suppose you’ve got my backpack?”
If it had been in the car with me, Sapphire had hopefully recovered it along with my person.
“Oh, we do, actually. It’s upstairs—what do you need?”
“Just my laptop. Maybe my notebooks, too—”
Oh, shit. I broke out in a sweat. They had almost certainly looked through my notebooks, and that was the exact kind of nightmare scenario behind putting a full-wipe protocol on my PC; there was some potentially sensitive and dangerous stuff in those that had gone unpublished. She saw my reaction both visually and in my vitals, shaking her head.
“We’re being respectful of your privacy, relax. Give me a few minutes.”
She left to get my bag, clicky footsteps reminiscent of high heels retreating down the hall. What a fascinating machine—and person, I supposed. At least she had an excuse for being mysterious—but I really ought to learn more about the Radiances themselves. I had a somewhat-embarrassing gap in my knowledge when it came to them and other second-tier VNT groups; until now, my focus had been almost exclusively on the Vaetna. I pulled out my phone.
My first stop was Wikipedia, for a brief history of the organization as a whole. They had an underground period before the donation of flame four years ago in 2018 that had propelled them to their current status; the building I was currently in was directly linked to that sequence of events, having been wrecked in their last major incident from that time. Amethyst and Heliotrope had joined the original three during that too. It was all rather interconnected, and after skimming their page for the broad timeline, I started to go through their individual pages, following links down the rabbit hole.
—
I was interrupted by Ebi’s return—half an hour later.
“Sorry. Amethyst had a thing.”
Well, I wasn’t going to hold that against her. She deposited the backpack on my bed and extracted the laptop, handing it to me gingerly. Shifting around to accept it and orient it on my lap aggravated my foot somewhat, and I winced.
“Ow. Painkillers up, please?”
For all my habitual shyness and being out of practice with talking to people in general, that at least was a familiar refrain from seven years ago. Ebi didn’t visibly do anything, but after a moment, sweet relief washed away the sting. A factoid I had discovered during my research sprang to mind.
“That’s probably something anchored on {NULL}, isn’t it. No opioids in Japan.”
“You catch on quick.”
I mulled that over. The glyph was stopping all sensation from about halfway down my shin; it would be even harder to walk with the prosthetic while it was active, as though I had lost my entire foot rather than just the toes. Poor Amethyst—although surely her prosthetics had much more nuanced senses and analgomancy.
“Thank you.”
“It’s what I’m for. Anything else?”
“I’m good—oh. What’s the wifi password?”
I should have asked sooner—my phone plan was probably charging an unholy amount for what I had already done on it today. It had slipped my mind until I had needed it for the laptop, since I was so unused to being out of the house.
“On Todai-Guest? ‘5ignition’, all lowercase, with the numeral.”
“Thanks. Er…that’s all, I think.”
She nodded. “Going back to Amethyst. Press the button if you need me—or message me, I suppose.”
“She alright?”
That was the sort of prying I had tried to avoid earlier—it had just slipped out. Ebi didn’t seem to mind, though. She actually grinned.
“As much as she ever is. She just wants to clean up a bit before meeting you.”
That was—flattering and unfamiliar. I was vaguely upset at the way it made me blush.
“Really?”
“She’s a big fan of yours, actually. Alright, back in…let’s say two hours.”
And she left me to chew on that. It made a fair amount of sense that I, an LM expert—albeit a theoretical one—would have a fan in the most prominent non-Vaetna LM user in the world. But I would have figured that she, as a flamebearer, would have been ahead of me on that; I only considered myself a hobbyist, someone interested in glyphcraft as an academic exercise and as a proxy for my interest in the Spire and the Vaetna. Perhaps I had misjudged that.
I greeted my friends again from my laptop and resumed my research. I was about ten minutes into an hour-long video of Todai’s overall timeline—at 2x speed, of course—when I thought I found a lead on one of the things that had been bugging me. I reached out to Star.
[Direct Message] ezzen: Hey
ezzen: So I’m watching https://youtu.be/S_XJYBx9WcL
ezzen: And something about Keisuke Akiyama is sticking out to me.
starstar97: hey i helped on that one
starstar97: shoot
ezzen: Uh. Can you keep a secret?
starstar97: ooh
starstar97: is the secret about you or lighthouse
ezzen: Lighthouse. And it’s a bit sensitive, apparently.
starstar97: i wont spill but i cant promise i wont have severe brainworms
Such was Star when it came to Todai.
ezzen: Okay so
ezzen: Sapphire told me Lighthouse used to have male members
starstar97: WHAT
starstar97: saj;lskdjfskl;da
starstar97: trans radiances… the theory lives… vindication…
starstar97: is what id LIKE to say, but say your bit first
ezzen: Yeah that’s where I’m going with it.
ezzen: Let me lay it out.
ezzen: So, from the video: Keisuke Akiyama gets flametouched. He gets in contact with Mr. Tanaka, and agrees to donate his flame to a good cause. The Lighthouse girls basically fall into their lap after they’ve recovered Amethyst and are an obvious choice to build a VNT group around. This leads to Todai’s official founding. Is that right so far?
starstar97: just about
starstar97: are you going to say akiyama is one of the radiances pre-transition
ezzen: My thunder, stolen!
ezzen: It’s just really convenient, isn’t it?
starstar97: 😛
starstar97: not a new theory
starstar97: but the consensus is that its probably a pseudonym for an actual person, not a deadname for one of them
starstar97: because if hes one of the five then where did the extra flame come from yknow
starstar97: and theres the magical complication
What she meant was that precise body modification magic was a bit of a white whale. Biomancy was a fledgeling field of magic compared to spatial or energy manipulation, because the Vaetna hadn’t seen fit to create many specifically applicable glyphs. They had always declined to comment on their rationale, but it was easy to see how extensive biological modification would be a difficult cat to put back in the bag, a slippery slope to eugenics in a world where the majority of magical access was already under the thumb of politicians and billionaires. Involuntary transformations did happen to some flamebearers, but those weren’t glyph magic; a complete roll of the dice when it came to ripple residuals, along the lines of super magic cancer or turning you into a crab or other such strange and incomprehensible tricks of the Flame. Not exactly gender-affirming care for most people.
That didn’t discourage me and several others from regularly returning to the problem, motivated by both the challenge and the feeling that if we figured something out, our findings could have some truly positive direct impact on people’s lives—not least for Star herself. But at this point, the problem was pretty much entirely academic; we had collectively concluded that changing one’s biological sex with magic to a degree superior to hormones and surgery was functionally impossible. We just didn’t have the right toolbox of glyphs.
The point was that Star and I both understood that it was extremely unlikely that Lighthouse had cracked that puzzle four years ago. If they had, surely they would have disseminated the glyph chains and procedures used. That was just the decent thing to do.
ezzen: Figured as much.
ezzen: So no trans Radiances :\
starstar97: well thats such a compelling nugget i dont want to just kill the theory
starstar97: can i ask what saph’s exact words were
ezzen: Uh
ezzen: I guess it was a bit roundabout?
ezzen: “You wouldn’t be the first [male Radiance]”, iirc
starstar97: yeah huh not a lot of ambiguity on that
starstar97: damn thats going to be my personal fuckin chew toy for a while
starstar97: i wish to gods they were trans but its totally just wishful thinking right
starstar97: bone structure n shit -.-
I agreed; Hina’s physique ruled her out. Opal and Heliotrope, too, if I was correctly remembering the pictures I had looked up earlier. The remaining two were maybe plausible—it felt wrong to theorize, both in the sense of imagining them naked and in that it was too personal now that I was coming face-to-face with them.
ezzen: Mhm
ezzen: So, other ideas?
starstar97: mm putting aside the trans thing for now
starstar97: i have two ideas
starstar97: first, its possible akiyama was originally going to just be part of the team and it didnt pan out
starstar97: dude did basically vanish after the donation (which supports the pseudonym thing)
ezzen: (notes)
ezzen: I could poke around about that.
starstar97: second: in december 2019 there were rumors that they were thinking about starting a second team, all male
starstar97: but that never went anywhere, partially because of concerns about popularity (classic idol group stuff)
I had just gotten to that part of the video, still playing picture-in-picture while we chatted.
ezzen: and because of blue spark right
starstar97: yeah it woulda killed the project in its infancy, if there was one, because of how todai messed up there
starstar97: imo it wasnt their fault
starstar97: but they need actual permits and stuff with the japanese government to be licensed flamebearers and there was no chance in hell that theyd actually get a whole new team in wake of that
starstar97: so yeah those are my ideas
starstar97: thats such a WEIRD thing for her to say
starstar97: sorta insensitive of her to say it that way if one of them IS trans though yknow
ezzen: I had the same thought.
She did seem to just be direct by nature.
starstar97: but ill dig a bit cause damn thats such ammo for the theory
starstar97: btw theres been a couple threads recently about what happened with you, you should take a look at those and maybe shoot down the really stupid stuff
We derailed into talking about those for a while, and unfortunately I never quite returned to fact-digging and timeline-checking after that. I wound up just watching Vaetna videos and chatting with my friends. I jumped when I realized Ebi was sort of looming behind my laptop screen.
“How—Jesus. How long have you been there?”
“Only about a minute.”
I needed a moment to catch my breath. Damn, I had wasted—almost two hours. It hadn’t been entirely fruitless, but ADHD had largely gotten the better of me once I had mentally categorized researching Todai as ‘work’. Nothing for it.
“Foot’s ready?”
“Yep. She actually already had it done, just obsessively tweaking it.” She harrumphed. “No point in that, really. She’s not going to be happy with it either way.”
That sounded familiar; I remembered countless hours drawing glyphs to solve logic puzzles and repeatedly finding better ways to optimize, sometimes until I had well undercut the ripple of the intended solution. Often I still ended the night—or morning, as was often the case—frustrated that I couldn’t find ways to push it further. Kindred spirits, although she was actually working in a lab instead of notation. Would she let me join her on those late-night projects, eventually? That sort of thing was a compelling reason to stay here, everything else notwithstanding. Like the karaoke fantasy from before, my imagination spun the image of the two of us bathed in monitor light, arguing about ripple management and the least-order principle over a GWalk diagram, applying our knowledge to real problems. We’d work into the night and we’d be aglow with pride in our work despite our exhaustion and at last I wouldn’t be alone—
I sighed. What an embarrassing tangent.
“Let’s—let’s go.”
To her credit, if Ebi saw what had just happened to my heart rate, she didn’t comment on it this time. She wheeled me out of the room and through the halls once more. First the emptiness of the 18th floor—I was glad to reach the elevator and return to the more populated halls of the basement, busier than before with the comings and goings of Ai’s underlings and other staff. I was recognized by an American, maybe a couple years my elder.
“Hey, you’re—uh, Dalton.”
That was delivered with a poorly executed wink. It seemed that my identity as Ezzen was a secret-in-name-only among Ai’s crew—but at least they didn’t seem to know I was that flametouched from Bristol, yet. They’d probably be treating me differently.
“Um. Yeah. Hello.”
In-person celebrity was not at all something I was experienced in, and it was horribly awkward. Ebi wasn’t about to bail me out, either, having adopted her android-persona, blandly smiling at the technician. It was deeply uncomfortable, maybe even creepy, to see her so docile and straight-backed, even after only a few hours of knowing her. She looked like she belonged in a maid uniform. I tried to treat the interaction as a warm-up for meeting Amethyst later.
“I’m on one of the teams working on your foot.” He stuck out a hand—glanced at the burns on my arm, thought better of it, switched hands. “Kyle.”
I shook it. “Thanks. For the foot. Anything interesting?”
Should I have introduced myself? He already knew it. Too late, either way.
“Not yet. Only so much you can do with half of a foot, y’know? We were sort of hoping you had ideas, actually.”
I had given it essentially zero thought, but I felt lame with nothing to offer—it was my foot, for Christ’s sake. I said the first thing that came to mind.
“Um—a booster?”
He stroked his stubble.
“What, like Peacie exos?”
“I guess?” I had actually been thinking of Heung’s carapace, but it was easier to just let him think whatever.
“Ah, gotcha.”
The technician—oh no, I had already forgotten his name—typed something into his phone.
“Tricky with one foot, but…we’ll see what we can do.” Then he looked around and lowered his voice. “Got a minute? The rest of the team would love to meet with you.”
“Mr. Colliot is being taken to the Prostheses Fitting Room for a meeting with Radiance Emerald.”
“Oh, fair, fair. I won’t keep you, then. Tell Ms. Matsumoto I said hi! See you around.”
He hurried past us down the hall. My phone buzzed.
[Direct Message] ebi-furai: (≧▽≦)
ebi-furai: a BOOSTER
I looked up at her. Her face remained impassive. Mine did not, invaded by a blush as I grumbled.
“I know, I know, IknowIknowIknow…”
ebi-furai: its fine
ebi-furai: you can talk over features with ai if you want
ebi-furai: but if you dont have ideas dont sweat it
As we proceeded down the corridor, an announcement came on the PA. A voice that was unmistakably Hina’s blared through the halls, husky and peppy, ending on a laugh that abruptly cut off. Ebi’s stride accelerated.
“Do I want to know?”
ebi-furai: its what it sounded like. shes on the prowl
Might as well reply in kind.
ezzen: For…me?
ebi-furai: afraid so
Oh, fantastic. I was being hunted. What had happened to Todai being safe? A new voice came on the PA, more apologetic.
ebi-furai: thats opal: ‘Terribly sorry for the ruckus, please forgive any inconvenience’
ebi-furai: shes going to take out some frustration on sapphire, if i had to guess
ezzen: Why?
ebi-furai: shes not very happy about the first impression sapphire made on you
That was—sort of a relief, actually. Hina had sort of primed me to expect nastiness from the remaining three Radiances, for all Ai seemed much more my speed. My—depressingly limited—research had somewhat restored my confidence in them, but it was nice to have some firsthand demonstration of their character.
ezzen: And they’re FIGHTING?
ebi-furai: its more like…tag
ebi-furai: theyre just roughhousing. you know the vaetna do this too
“The Vaetna keep it in the upper Spire.” I didn’t much fancy being caught in the crossfire.
This hallway was empty now, so she spoke out loud. “It’s also an exercise in minimizing collateral damage. You’re not in danger, just a convenient target for her.”
“Why’s she so…after me?” I resisted the urge to say ‘into me’; that was wishful thinking for sure.
“Beats me. Sorry for leaving you with her. Didn’t have much choice.”
“What do you mean?”
“She kicked me out.”
“Out of the room?”
Ebi waggled her virtual eyebrows, which I took to be a no. That meant—
“Out of…3-space? Are you 4-brane all the way through? I saw your hands, but—”
She’d have been chewed up like one of us three-dimensional meat-beings if she wasn’t built for that. Of course, all the Radiances were able to shunt their bodies out of 3-space when they transformed, but exactly how remained a secret known only to them. Part of me wanted to join just so they’d show me how—my animal fear of Hina put a stop to that.
“I am, but not all of it is modular.”
That was fascinating to me. I wondered again what she would look like in the eyes of a Vaetna, who could perceive her full form at once. Some kind of Vitruvian arrangement of all her configurations?
“And that’s all Ai’s weave?”
“Sure is.” Oddly, she didn’t sound very pleased about that, almost sighing in her synthetic voice.
I itched to pursue the topic further, but I knew I wouldn’t get a straight answer about how exactly she had been made or how that related to Ai’s broader philosophy on her flame. I had gotten some clarity from my research about how exactly Ai had wound up with her specialty in robotics and prosthetics, but the organization had seemingly remained quite tight-lipped about the details of their magic, and of course Ebi seemed to not exist at all in the public eye. I put it aside for now, thinking over my conversation with Star, potential secrets.
“What did Hina mean that there were male Radiances?”
“Did—she said that?” There was genuine surprise in the robot’s voice.
“You don’t know?”
“No.”
Her poker face was impeccable.
“Really?”
“Really.”
“Um—huh.”
I hadn’t been expecting that. Of course, she could just be lying to me, which did sort of seem like something she’d do if any of the theories held water—but she had sounded truly surprised.
“Well, she did. I’m trying to figure out what she meant.”
“It might have been before my time. I don’t have perfect access to records, you know.”
“You’re their doctor.”
At least that was soft-confirmation that she had been made post-founding, not that that came as much of a surprise.
“A lot of the stuff around the founding is classified, even to me. You know how idol groups take protecting their members fairly seriously?”
“I don’t, really, but go on.”
“It’s that, multiplied by the fact that Lighthouse is paramilitary. Infosec against VNT groups is hard with the ripple in play, so their time underground before the official founding is pretty locked down, although of course there’s only so much that can be done. It’s digital and magical—I know of at least two spots in the database where they tell you in big bold letters that ‘UNAUTHORIZED ACCESS TO THIS DOCUMENT WILL TRIGGER:’ and then a long list of stuff that scrambles the hell out of your device and your brain.”
Yikes.
“So…anything about hypothetical male members would be behind that same level of security.”
Especially if something had gone wrong.
“Mhm. Above both of our paygrades. It’d be easier to ask Ai directly.”
Good timing; we had arrived once again at the doorway to Ai’s workshop. Actually, we were across the hall. She met us at the door, giving Ebi another big hug, speaking to me with her face smushed against the carbon fiber plates. The robot hugged her back.
“I have something for you to try.”
No greeting, again. “Lead the way.”
This was a custom medical bay, one I recognized from a few videos. There was some fairly standard medical equipment scattered around, scanners and an IV unit and such—and some things that were more obviously custom-designed for Amethyst’s physical condition. Most prominently, from the ceiling hung a number of tentacular soft-robotics appendages, to help maneuver her into place inside the intricate circle of glyphs on the floor below it. This was one of the few places in the facility she couldn’t mantle without disrupting the existing glyphs and weave.
“This is where Amethyst gets her prosthetics fitted, right?”
In hindsight, if the 18th floor was ostensibly the medical zone, it was odd that this particular room was down here. Maybe proximity to Ai’s workshop was valuable.
“Yes. Into the field, please, Ebi-tan.”
Oh no, tentacles?
Ebi just pushed my bed into the circle, the air within glowing a faint green. My at-a-glance reading and context told me that this was a mix of more specialized analgesics—analgomancy, technically—and some corrective forces to help the subject balance. She didn’t enter it herself, though—she actually used a long stick to get me partway in before some motive glyphs kicked in to guide me the rest of the way. I guessed that, like Amethyst, somehow the circle would disrupt her weave or vice-versa. I wondered if a Vaetna would just shred the circle by entering. It didn’t occur to me until much later to wonder why my or Ai’s tattoo bindings weren’t an issue.
“It’ll take a moment to kick in. Sorry.” Ebi didn’t sound very apologetic—
Pain, blinding. I made a choking, moaning sound, my head retreating into my hunched shoulders. There was no sensation but the pain slamming upward from the stump at the end of my leg. I instinctively began to curl up—
Then blessed, total relief. As basic cognition returned, I understood that that had been the momentary switchover from the bed’s local, imprecise painkiller glyphs to the circle’s more calibrated ones. My foot didn’t hurt—thank fuck, that had been horrible—but the overall numbness had gone. I was really not looking forward to later stages of physical therapy where we’d forego the analgomancy.
“Fuck you, Ebi,” I coughed. She chuckled.
Ai’s voice was more genuinely sorry. “It hurts more if you’re braced for it.”
I nodded, still somewhat trying to recover my breath. From my supine position, I hadn’t seen the temporary prosthetic on the desk. Ai collected it and brought it over to me, face twitching incrementally as she stepped into the circle. Her ponytail had come a bit loose, I noticed, stray hairs lending her an even more harried and exhausted appearance further at odds with how she looked during photo ops. How comprehensive was her makeup routine to hide the bags under her eyes? Not that I had any frame of reference for that stuff.
I inspected the prosthetic. Printed resin, seemingly, in simple dark-grey, the same color as Ebi’s chassis. It had a few moving parts, but nothing obviously motorized. The toes came in two segments—the big toe and a single block representing the other four. She flipped it over, and I saw that the sole and pads of the toes had a strange foam—oh. That was the same resin, a section of each part printed at lower density for padding. I didn’t have much appreciation for non-magical engineering, but even I had to admit that was a nice trick. Little things like that were why she was considered one of the world’s experts in cutting-edge magical prosthesis design, a result of her time helping Amethyst.
“Since I hear my teammate is being…herself, I want to make this quick. The prosthetic attaches with {AFFIX}, no physical socket or suspension. Your blood price being such a clean cut made that easy. My weave, of course—the final version will need that to be yours, although now that I’ve browsed your file I don’t think that will be a problem. The final version will have some socketing for a seal so nothing gets in, and some more liner at the connection point or a more complex connection spell to make it more comfortable. Small-scale analgesoid glyph that should stop most of the pain without killing your sensation, more or less how the circle is making it feel now.”
“What’s the analgesoid?”
“{AFFIX}-{DEFLECT} sub 2.”
“Sub 2” was a diagramming shorthand describing a second-order—that was, three-dimensional—glyph being offset down on the Z-axis from its anchor. I nodded, picturing the diagram in my head, although I couldn’t quite wrap my head around the lattices proper without the glyphs in front of me to reference.
“Pink link?”
The link of the chain wasn’t literally pink; the color-coding was shorthand for different channels of ripple, a standard established by the Spire’s lattice displays. She nodded.
“You really are the Ezzen. Some of my students would have said blue.”
I blushed and avoided her eyes.
“What else…the resin is lightweight, but I’ve added a few nodules of osmoid LM to get the mass and weight distribution equal to your other foot. Not perfect, but…well. The toes have torsion springs to assist your step…that’s about it. No sensation or direct control of the toes, so your gait will be a little shaky.”
She obviously knew her stuff. She bent over my foot, using some precise cuts of magic to remove the gauze from my amputation, and inspected the site momentarily. She seemed satisfied and reached over to some cabinet inside the bedframe to extract a surprisingly mundane antiseptic spray bottle and cloth.
“Looks alright. Cleaning now. This will tickle, I apologize.”
“Why regular cleaning? Didn’t you just use magic to take off the gauze?”
“Why do you think?”
Excitement—this was going to become a lesson. “Um—I think you used {SEVER} on the gauze?”
Obviously, she hadn’t scribed the literal glyph that represented {SEVER}; rather, she had simply cast the first-order spell so fluently she hadn’t even needed to gather a real spool. But she had said she wasn’t as good at snapweaving—oh. I looked over at the circle and found the glyph in the perimeter. She nodded in the corner of my eye. I went on, trying to keep my voice level. It did tickle a bit.
“By contrast, the chain you’d need to clean the wound is, uh, {DIFFERENTIATE}-{ASH}? I think? To tell apart the pus and the scar tissue.”
The sequence there mattered—scribed as glyphs, the first spell was the anchor and the second extended from it. There were complicated rules about which glyphs could connect to which depending on which was the anchor, as well as what order—that was, dimensionality—the glyph was, and so on.
She nodded approvingly as she carefully scrubbed at my wound. The magitech had already pushed the healing process maybe a week ahead of where it’d be naturally, although it was nowhere near fully healed. It oozed pus, and I was grateful again that I couldn’t feel what was going on down there beyond some faint pressure. Burns healed ugly.
“Good. So why didn’t I do that?”
“Risk assessment. Already too high on the complexity curve given that severing more of my foot would be, uh, bad. Obviously.”
She grinned, and for a moment, I understood why they were called Radiances. It practically lit up the room. Hina’s smile was impish at best or predatory at worst, paralytic in its promise—Ai’s was a lantern, someone worthy of standing with the Vaetna, of wielding the Frozen Flame for the betterment of the world. It scoured away her exhaustion, and beneath it, her passion for magic called to me, imploring me to join her, to follow whatever path she had found. She was pretty, which was also part of it, but the feeling inside me wasn’t carnal attraction. I was a moth faced with a flame that promised to illuminate the world.
Ebi made a decidedly mechanical clicking noise. I looked at her, the spell broken.
“Did you just take a photo?”
“You can prove nothing.”
I gawked at the robot. In my peripheral vision, Ai rolled her eyes.
“Four out of five—minus one for having the wrong second spell on the chain. Noun exclusion. Give me a first-order that would work and how you’d mitigate the risk.”
I shook myself a bit, returning to the practical problem, an eager student for once. {SEVER}? No, it’d Zeno. {SEVER} cut in flat planes; chained off of {DIFFERENTIATE}, it would continuously cut along the rough geometry of my partially healed injury more and more precisely, but would never actually reach the end of the operation within a finite time. Akin to Zeno’s Paradox, thus the rule. I kept thinking. I was embarrassing myself a bit, here. I was more comfortable with LM projection lattices, like Spire dermis or Radiance mantles, than stuff that interfaced directly with organics—oh. Thinking about it from that angle—
“{OFFSET}.”
She blinked. “Defend your reasoning.”
“Green link would loop the ripple away from degradation. It’d pigeonhole into a clean pop.”
Ebi broke in. “Would you bet your foot on that?”
I shrugged. “I’m right. Run it in GWalk.”
Ai nodded. “It works, although that’s a fairly static approach. Hard to snapweave through green. I would use {EXTRACT}.”
Oh. That made sense. I had been thinking too spatially—simply extracting the pus was an approach that avoided the spatial complexities of working around organic matter. That was a good example of how, with the tools available, biomancy was more about doing as little actual biomancy as possible.
Ai affixed the prosthetic to the flat plane of my injury. I actually felt the lattice sort of “stitch” it to my foot. It was neither painful nor itchy, some other sensation that came from magic which my basic senses didn’t really have an equivalent for, more like a twisting, kneading force. She offered me her hand to help me sit up on the bed, and pulled me upright with a momentary display of that VNT effortlessness, bringing in her other arm to steady me.
“Time for you to try to stand. Let me just—”
I felt it as she engaged some of the spatial and motive components. The active parts of the spell circle were now a dizzyingly complex weave in my burgeoning magical senses, the flame inside me roiling and twitching as it investigated the delicate weave surrounding us; I had to shut it out to focus on the act of balance as she helped me off the bed. She helped me balance on my good foot with both magic and her arms as I gingerly lowered my stump. Despite my conscious knowledge of the analgomancy blocking my pain, some primal part of me was tense as the prosthetic’s toes made contact with the floor. But none came as I put more pressure on it, feeling the springs provide some counter-force, and at last my heel touched the ground. Then I tried to put some weight on it—
I stumbled. The magic caught me immediately, not helping me stand but just catching me as I fell. Ai helped me back upright. How many hours had she spent helping Amethyst like this, in this room? She had a hand on my back.
“Breathe out.”
I had been holding my breath? Oh. So I was. A long exhale—then I tried again, more gingerly this time, right leg shaking a bit with the unfamiliarity of the lack of sensation in my toes. My muscle memory was thrown off despite the foot itself being a perfect fit. Still, it went better this time. I stood on my own two feet—foot and a half, maybe, but still. Ai let go of me and I just stood there, relishing the…uprightness. I resisted the urge to attempt to take a step, even knowing that I wouldn’t fall.
Ai gave a satisfied nod. “Good! Try to just stand up and sit down a few times, like you normally would.”
I did so. I felt like I was getting the hang of it fast. Maybe I could try to take a step?
I didn’t get the chance. Something zipped past the closed door to the room, a yell dopplering down the hall. Then there was a crash. Ebi shrugged as if to say “called it.” Emerald sighed, long-suffering, and strode to the door. Ebi provided interpretation—not in her own voice, an imitation of her creator’s.
“LITERALLY ANYWHERE ELSE. No, I don’t care if she deserved it, out of my wing. OUT. Ishikawa-chan, why didn’t you stop them?”
Ebi broke from the impression to make her own comment. “She can’t stay mad at Amethyst.”
Then she resumed. “No. No! You tell her—oh. She said—oh, seriously? Okay, yes, she deserved it. Still. Mhm. Huh? No, I was in the middle of—”
Another crash. Someone was yelling. Then it became a roar—which meant it was Opal. I put my face in my hands. Ebi leaned out the doorway to peer at whatever was happening. That seemed gratuitous; she was probably wired into the security cameras.
“Heliotrope is going to be so mad she missed this.”
Author’s Note:
Definitely-cis magical girls and sassy robots, that’s Sunspot.
Thanks to Cassiopeia, Zak, and Maria for proofreading; this chapter got so much stronger after their feedback.
Join the Discord to discuss the story and hang out with other Sunspot readers!
Join the Patreon to support the story and read chapters three weeks ahead of public!
It didn’t take long for Ebi to show up and break me out of my reverie, staring at the blood drying on the bedsheets.
“I apologize for Sapphire’s behavior.”
I looked up at her, somehow unsurprised that she had simply reappeared. A trick like Heung’s spear, maybe—that wasn’t some kind of flamebearer intuition for whatever lattice animated her, it was an educated guess. There were only so many ways to shunt that much matter in or out of our three-dimensional reality, and many of them had visual tells that she lacked. I looked at the robot—didn’t quite make it to her eyes. I wound up directing my gaze at her neck.
“Apology accepted? If I’m not a prisoner. Am I?”
“Not in those words. This is one of the safest places in the world for you.”
“But you won’t let me leave.”
“Opal thinks it won’t come to that.”
Well, it sounded like I didn’t have much control over that at the moment, so no point in pursuing it. I had other curiosities, ones more rooted in my passion for magic than my new circumstances.
“What’s your deal?”
“You mean the state of my intelligence?”
“Sure.”
She wasn’t visibly doing anything as she stood there, but I got the sense she was reading my chart, or my file. It was a safe bet that she knew who I was, even though she had been out of the room when Hina had said it out loud.
“I am sapient, but not sentient.”
That was vaguely insulting to my intelligence. She came over and gestured toward my arm. I looked at her. Her fingers twitched in a ‘come here’ motion. After a long, long moment of incredulous glaring—I gave her my arm.
“Bullshit.”
She had the audacity to wink at me even as her voice remained level.
“Blood pressure and O2 are good, and your foot looks stable. Are there any parts of your body that hurt?”
“Foot aches a bit. Don’t dodge the question.” I felt like it should be hurting more; maybe it was just that I hadn’t moved it.
“I am animated by Emerald’s magic. I’m not at liberty to say more, like I said. Are you feeling well enough to see her now?”
I had guessed that much—Radiance Emerald was the team’s technical magic expert, the ‘guy in the chair’ of their classical five-man-band. All five were veteran flamebearers, and therefore specialists at magic in one way or another; her field bridged the gap between conventional engineering and weaving. She was the one Hina had said to go see.
“For my foot?”
“And more general greetings. You’ve gotten off on the wrong foot by meeting Sapphire first.”
The wrong foot. The robot’s digital expression didn’t give anything away, but she practically radiated smugness at the joke. I looked down at the mound under the blanket created by the stump and sighed.
“Sure. Can’t exactly walk like this, though.”
“I’ll take you down. The bed moves.”
That harkened back to my last extended time in a hospital, although I had been more ambulatory then, with a ruined hand rather than foot. Still, being carted through the halls in a bed sounded humiliating—especially if the average employee here also knew my other identity.
“No wheelchair?”
“Just stay where you are for now. The bed’s doing a whole lot.”
Right, the painkiller magic—analgomancy, if you wanted to be technical. I decided to trust her judgment that the bed was the right call for now, although getting some control over my own mobility was rapidly becoming a priority, with how threatened I had felt by Hina.
Not just threatened. She had been so close to me; I hadn’t been that close to another person my age in—ever? It prodded at a kind of buried loneliness, a part of youth I had missed out on, spending all those years cooped up alone in that room. The intimate contact her posture had suggested was totally alien to me—yet desirable, confusingly so, in spite of how terrifying she had been. I couldn’t get her out of my head, replaying those few moments over and over.
Ebi snorted. “Attractive, isn’t she?”
I jerked my arm out of her grip, positive she had read my vitals for that bit of insight. “Right freaky’s what she was. They’re not all like that, I hope?”
“In their own ways. If you mean whether any of the others will climb up on your bed—doubtful. Don’t look so disappointed.”
I glared at her, resenting how I was blushing from something more than embarrassment. Ebi showed me some mercy and didn’t pursue the topic.
“Let me take you to Emerald—to Ai. Sapphire will stop pestering you about it.”
She waved her hand, and my entire bed began to move. Not floating, I thought, but probably magically assisted suspension for the wheels. I wiggled my ankle experimentally.
“This is beyond regen, right?”
I hadn’t really made my peace with the loss so much as I had assumed that Lighthouse or the Spire could offer me a prosthetic at least as good as the original.
“It is. How much do you know about Amethyst’s prostheses?”
I thought. The Vaetna and glyph magic itself were my areas of real expertise; I had a decent amount of knowledge about magitech, but not much focus on specific flamebearers unless it hit on one of my passions. For example, I knew more about Amethyst’s transformation than her prosthetics.
“Only the basics. Left arm, left foot…something about her lungs?”
“Internals are a mess. But the relevant thing is that they’re self-animated, like her mantle or Vaetna carapace.”
That made me wince. I was starting to see the problem.
“So in addition to the physical therapy, I’d need—”
“Months of magical training. Maybe years. She’s still not fully comfortable with her leg—but then, she hardly ever uses it, and you’re starting from an expert level of theory from what I hear, so maybe you’ll go faster. Either way, since it’s just the foot, we’ll have you on crutches or in a wheelchair within the day, I think. We had you on eightfold healing.”
We arrived at an elevator without encountering any other staff. Ebi called it without hitting the button.
“Where is everybody?”
“Oh, medical’s mostly just me when we don’t have anybody in. This is my crib.”
“Just you for the whole floor?”
“All of eighteen, yep.”
Perhaps I had underestimated her qualifications. She carted me into the elevator and sent us downward, destination: B1F. It was a big building by my standards for these things, twenty stories top to bottom, plus three basement levels. The organization was so young that the building was actually a hospital that had been bought for some obscene sum of money and converted—but that was about the extent of my knowledge, off-the-cuff. I couldn’t recall exactly where in the city we were, and my phone was getting no reception in the elevator.
“Where in Tokyo are we?”
“Akasaka. That’s—”
She projected a holographic map of the city. It took me a moment to orient myself. If the Imperial Palace was the center, we were just to the southwest. I noted that we were close to the Diet and some other major landmarks—including the local Gate. If I were to make a run for it—that was the destination.
The elevator dinged, and we exited into a small corridor, a little more industrial, with a concrete floor and lit by full-spectrum LEDs rather than the warmer light of the elevator and higher corridors. Ebi took me down the hall, and we arrived at a pair of double doors. They slid open, and I recognized the room from videos, one of Todai’s main assets that set them apart from other groups.
Emerald’s workshop was enormous, an ex-garage. Half-disassembled jetbikes lay surrounded by parts and toolkits, patients abandoned mid-surgery. Workstations featuring holographic displays shared space with entirely manual machine shop tools from the previous century. More modern 21st-century machines also abounded, and rarely just one of any. I didn’t have the technical knowledge to label most of what I was looking at, beyond the obvious things like the lathes or the enormous metal printers—the bottom line was that this shop was built for ideation more than mass production, and had the breadth of tooling to look the part.
However, I only had eyes for what dominated the far wall: a huge array of glyphs spanning two to four dimensions, intricately connected, all mounted and ready to be powered at a moment’s notice. They corresponded to various effects and operations to be done within a large cubic space, maybe three meters to a side, which hovered on that side of the room, clearly demarcated by a variety of holographic barriers and “CAUTION: THIS MACHINE IS CARNIVOROUS”-type signage; I knew those weren’t facetious. Above it hung a candelabra of tooling, the maw of some great beast of hardened steel and carbide, itself using magic to enable tool swaps and precision at speeds far higher than the mundane equivalent.
The array enabled otherwise prohibitively expensive or outright impossible fabrication conditions like zero-gravity, hard vacuum for cold welding, spatial affix work-holding, and the ability to symmetrically and radially mirror operations around an axis, among others. Most notably, it could operate in four dimensions, making it invaluable for the manufacture of third-order lattice substrate, an essential element of the chain of production that allowed developed and magic-available countries to bootstrap themselves further up the tech tree in this new era. I was in awe—none of the arrays like this anywhere in the world were open to the public, and I had sort of resigned myself to never getting the chance to see them in person. There were only four outside the Spire.
The shop was also shockingly quiet in spite of the maybe three dozen people scattered around, clustered around various parts and machines. Magical soundproofing was both energetically cheap and easy to install, a fact leveraged here in abundance where the Radiances could be depended on to keep them running. We passed the threshold and made our way toward where Emerald was sitting at a desk with four monitors. She had one of those funky split keyboards and was currently neck-deep in modeling…something. Third-order glyph substrate embedded in something else, maybe. She saw us coming in a convex mirror mounted on the desk and spun in her chair to face us. The entire thing was on what looked to be a motorized base.
“Ebi-tan! This is him?”
Unlike Hina, who sounded straight-up American, Ai Matsumoto had a noticeable—if minor—Japanese accent and a bright and clear voice. This clashed somewhat with an otherwise rather gruff look: jeans, closed-toed shoes, and the scar that ran down the right of her chin to her throat. Her hair was black and long, held back in a simple ponytail. Her arms were bare—and muscular. I figured that was just a hobby; if she ever needed serious physical strength, she could always just mantle.
She also looked—exhausted, frankly. The bags under her brown eyes made her seem like she was in her thirties rather than the twenty-something she actually was. Like Hina’s predator teeth, that was never something I had seen in promotional material for them. Unlike Hina, though, this felt like a sign of her mortality; she had clearly been missing nights of sleep on some project. It was the good kind of fatigue, a familiar kind born of great joy and perhaps obsession in something. Hina and Ebi had had a sort of weightlessness I associated with the Vaetna as well; Ai was much more grounded and human.
Ebi shot off a stiff-sounding greeting in Japanese and managed half a bow before nearly teleporting over to Ai to wrap her in a hug. The Radiance made an adorable squealing sound and nuzzled into the machine-woman’s carbon fiber chest for a moment before seeming to remember herself and refocusing on me.
“Hina-san says you bound something to yourself. She also said you did a bad job of it. Show me.”
My bed floated closer, and she hopped out of her chair, jogging over to meet me and inspect my arm. I noted the total lack of greeting—I assumed that meant she either didn’t know or didn’t care that I was Ezzen. Later, with more knowledge of Japanese honorifics, I would also come to understand the strangeness of the appellation she used for Hina. She prodded at the burned image of the spear, as well as kind of waving her fingers in the air around it, getting a feel for the lattice. It tickled, sort of.
“Mm. Vaetna-style for sure. Weave is—very sloppy, but you’re new. Would you take it out?”
I was grateful again for the painkillers as I obliged, motivated by her visible interest in the magic rather than the fear from before. Ai walked along the side of the bed, eyeing the cut that had reopened on my arm, muttering something in Japanese to Ebi. Then she went to inspect the spear itself.
“Just a regular wooden—oh.” She had spotted what Hina had called ripple warping on the blade. “I haven’t looked at the report yet. You did this?”
“Um, yes. To, er—” I scrambled for one of the only bits of Japanese I knew. “Ah—hikari wo osaeru?”
To contain the light, when I had averted the inferno at first. This was a cultural difference—the East conceptualized the Frozen Flame as light rather than fire. That was the basis for Lighthouse’s theming. She nodded approvingly.
“You’re saying it wrong, but I get the meaning. Hikari wo osaeru, like that.”
I couldn’t really hear a difference, other than the fact that her voice was outright melodic in her native tongue. I recalled that she was a fairly popular singer in her free time—for a moment I had a wild, ridiculous fantasy of going to a karaoke bar together, before remembering I couldn’t sing and would die of embarrassment in a setting like that. She said something to Ebi, and my arm stopped bleeding, although the gash didn’t close, and the sting remained.
“Why do you have this?”
“Um…I like Heung. He saved me once.” It was embarrassing to say out loud.
“Mm. It’s nice. You made it yourself?”
“Er—yes. Can’t get them legally in the UK.”
She grinned. “I use one too. May I?”
Oh, right, she did—so why not. Maybe I’d learn something. I offered it, but as she pulled the spear from my grip—no. No, she couldn’t, I needed that—I was still in danger. I had to be able to hurt it or else there was no—
I reflexively tried to put it back in my arm, reaching for the lattice on pure panicked instinct. The spear tried to fold into my arm, to mesh with the cut, and tugged Ai back toward me with it. She whirled, confusion on her face. Then she seemed to understand what was happening and planted her feet. Something shifted, and for a moment she stood like a Vaetna, that impression that physics was optional. Suddenly, I was the one being tugged, yanked out of the bed by the magic—
I would have slammed into the concrete floor. As it was, Ebi mostly caught me, but only mostly—the impact still broke my grip on the spear, and I lay there, dazed. My first thought was that my jaw hurt. My second was that I hoped I hadn’t just bitten off my tongue. Noticing the commotion, some of the other people in the workshop began to hurry over. I felt arms lift me and deposit me back in the bed.
“No fractures…I just gave you an anticoncussive. You got very lucky regarding your tongue.”
“I know,” I groaned. My head throbbed even through the painkillers.
Ai appeared on my other side, seeming genuinely distressed. “Sorry, so sorry. Ebi-tan?”
They conversed in Japanese for a few moments, and the woman visibly relaxed. I heard her mutter something to herself that sounded an awful lot like “bakabakabaka.” She refocused on me.
“So, so sorry. I didn’t mean to—aaa, korosarecchau—I just wanted to try the spear.”
Ebi said something softly to her, and Ai shook her head, ponytail wagging.
“It is my fault. I realized what you were doing and wanted to see what would happen to your lattice if I put tension on it. I wasn’t thinking. Please forgive me.”
She looked dejected for a moment, then something in her shifted. She retrieved the spear and brought it to me, her motions once again those of mortals. I clutched it pathetically, humiliated by my own reaction but unable to bring myself to let go. As I breathed slowly and calmed down, I managed a chuckle as I reflected on it. Not the best first impression, but—
“It’s fine. I would have done the same thing.”
She looked at me thoughtfully. Then she bowed, shook her head again, and paced down toward my feet, inspecting my gauze-wrapped leg. How much it had already healed, if it had effectively been something like a week, thanks to the magic?
“We’re going to do something about this. I was going to anyway, but now…”
She turned and raised her voice. It took me a moment to understand she was yelling names—and still speaking in English. Her voice had taken on an authoritative edge; it fit her surprisingly well. The exhaustion seemed to drop from her face for the moment, overridden by willpower. A crowd gathered around us, a mix of students around my or her age, but some of the engineers and machinists had to be at least twice that—and they were all subordinate to her.
“—Two weeks. You’ll all get the same dimensions and scans. Basic design goals comply with LIPS-2 like what we made for Amethyst last year, bonus credit for anything beyond if you can justify it or if he likes it. Give me something I would be proud to wear.”
Not a single one complained about the sudden project. Some of them looked outright excited and were already pointing at me and muttering. Did they already know who I was? She hadn’t said it out loud, at least. More to the point—did I want to be her charity case? Part of me wanted to research a way to magic my way out of the disability entirely, some kind of LM construct for my foot. Ebi poked me, and I jumped—I had forgotten she was there.
“Take it. Ai does her best work when she feels guilty.”
I sighed internally—then externally. I had suffered enough in these past 24 hours. My stupid ego could swallow some kindness, especially if it lacked an ulterior motive like Sapphire’s had.
The engineers dispersed, hurrying off toward their desks. Ai turned back to me. Her voice had lost that entire hard facade, now timid.
“I’m sorry, again. Would you allow me to fix your binding?”
I hesitated. There was a sort of sentimentality in it, my first ever real bit of lasting, woven magic. But Sapphire had been right, it was impractically sloppy now that I was out of immediate danger. And I understood that this was still her way of trying to get off on the right foot.
“Yes, please. Hina said a tattoo binding?”
“Yes. Ink or LM?”
LM stood for lattice-manifest, the general term for matter directly generated by magic. Lighthouse were experts in it, overshadowed by only the Spire—like everyone else with a magical specialization; along with my personal connection to Heung, that was why I had primarily focused on the Vaetna over the other prominent VNT groups. They were simply a cut above in everything, but especially magic. They had introduced weaving, come up with the core lexicon of glyphs, and still remained far ahead of the curve.
I did want to do LM, but unfortunately, some things were just beyond my abilities for now.
“I don’t think I can do LM, not straight onto my skin. The most complicated thing I’ve cast is {COMPOSE}.”
“Oh. Yes, that would…that makes sense. Ink, then. Ebi-tan?”
I was a bit surprised that the machine-woman was the tattoo artist of choice. Then I thought about it a moment and—of course she was. Ebi’s hand disappeared in the same way a piece of paper did when turned parallel to one’s view, the three-dimensional object rotated in the fourth dimension such that it disappeared completely. After a moment, the process reversed, revealing a tattoo gun. I guessed that much of her body was 4-brane to enable swaps like this; it made sense for a medical robot. How would she look to a Vaetna?
“Color?”
I hadn’t thought this far ahead; I had never gotten a tattoo. “Um. What are the options?”
“Anything you want. We have the full spectrum in opaques, metallics, and iridescents.”
This felt like an important decision, but one I had no frame of reference for. “What would you think would look good?”
Ebi grinned at that. “We can temp it.”
In response, Ai retrieved something from a drawer in her desk, extracting it from a plastic bag. It was a translucent gossamer sheet.
“Arm, please.”
I offered my arm, and she wrapped the membrane around. It vacuum-sealed to my skin. A little uncomfortable, but not really squeezing. It flickered, and after a moment, the burn scar representing my spear vanished. I jerked—then realized the lattice of my binding was still there.
“Just a visual trick, don’t worry.”
Ebi—maybe Ai?—manipulated the membrane to project a design onto my arm in the same shape as my scar. Ebi withdrew a touchscreen tablet from somewhere within the bed, fiddled with it for a moment, and handed it to me. It showed a number of sliders and settings. “Take your time.”
I experimented for a few minutes. My pale skin was a good canvas for simple black or blue ink, but that felt a little mundane. On the flip side, a bright color and a fancy type of ink that caught the light came off as overly gaudy. As was so often the case, the best answer lay somewhere in the middle. Ai commented when I came to an iridescent dark blue-green.
“I like that. Ebi-tan?”
“Looks alright. The magenta was good too.”
I couldn’t decide. Choice paralysis was often a struggle for me, and this was no different. Eventually, I gave up and asked if they had a coin. Ai produced a 500-yen, a fat, two-tone thing, gold on silver. I flipped—heads. Dark iridescence it was. The template dissolved, the burn scar reappearing.
“Are you going to have to fully unmake the lattice?”
“I can reweave it in-place. I’m not very good at Vaetna-style, but…”
We sat in awkward silence for a moment. Then my magic-knowledge kicked in, dissatisfactions from the first time. I muttered, oddly embarrassed about the specificity.
“Ventral rethread with a finer spool. Leave the spinal mesh, it’s good enough. I messed up layers 3 and 23 on the first axis, and my passthrough between axes was sloppy.”
Her eyebrows went up. “Oh. Your theory is far better than your execution…” She trailed off as she caught the backhanded compliment. “Of course it is. I’m sorry. Yes, I can do that.”
This whole affair had been rather awkward so far, and neither of us could meet the other’s eyes. She was looking down at my arm, and I was casting my gaze around the room to avoid looking at her. Ebi cleared her throat. Well, she didn’t have a throat, but it was a good imitation. Ai jerked and blinked a few times, eyes flicking to the robot before refocusing on me. Had…had she fallen asleep, for a moment? It didn’t show in her voice, at least.
“Would you gather your thread for me? I’ll spin it and weave it for you.”
“Um…sure. Are you just going to tattoo straight over the scar?”
“We’ll have to reopen the wound. Please bring it out?”
I did, feeling the sting for what would probably be the last time. Ebi’s hands blurred, and she grabbed my wrist. Before I even reacted, she had injected local anesthesia and was stitching the gash. I reflexively jerked away despite the lack of pain—her grip was iron. When the sutures were done, she sprayed it with some kind of foam, which dissolved the stitches and left a patch of blank flesh. The whole process had taken maybe a minute.
“Christ.”
Ebi replied with a wink, proud of her work. Then she set about affixing my arm to the bedframe; evidently, the tattoo required more precision than the suture job had.
Time for magic. I hesitated, staring at my arm, my magic-sense running along the lattice. I tried to reach for the Flame—jerked back before I made contact. Ai looked at me. “It has to be your thread.”
I knew that, but—a fear lay within me. That horrible animal perspective I had found in those moments of pain…I hated it. It was—frustrating, wrong. The voices—whatever they were—had agreed that it wasn’t how it should be; weaving was supposed to be better than the cruelty of pure blood magic. And yet I had been causing harm in just the same way, angry at my Flame. Were all of us? Even the Vaetna, those paragons I and so many others all but worshiped?
I had to give it voice, explain what I was feeling, and she felt like the right person—better than Sapphire, at least. I almost whispered.
“They made it look so easy.”
Her eyes searched my face. Did she get it? I went on hesitantly. This felt profane. “It hurts. Both ways.”
Her voice was as quiet as mine. “You’re like Hina-san.”
“I’m—what?”
“She hurts her Flame.”
I resented the comparison, having seen the hyena.
“It—I guess? But I don’t want to. I was desperate. I—don’t know any other way.” That horrible thought struck me again. “There…there is another way, right?”
That seemed to physically hit Ai. She struggled with something. Her lips squirmed, and she gave the impression that she was digging up bad memories. That was half an answer in itself; maybe I had misjudged why she was losing sleep. Eventually, she spoke.
“There is.”
“How?”
“Sacrifice,” Ebi broke in, now configuring the tattoo gun.
I looked at the machine-woman, some dark comprehension growing. “Sanguimancy?”
Ebi glanced at the Radiance for a long moment, then shook her head. Ai muttered darkly, almost angrily. Some of the exhaustion on her face came into her voice. “We’re not all Yuuka-chan, or Hina-san. There’s other choices.”
“What…are they?”
The question was difficult to force out. It implied a huge gap in my knowledge of magic, an aspect outside of the glyphcraft I knew so well—but just as essential.
“I’ll show you. Draw the thread, please.”
I was quiet for a long, long moment, dreading it. Then I took a deep breath—and pulled it from myself. My burn scars ignited as they had last time, and I winced, less at the discomfort I was feeling and more at the pain I now understood I was inflicting on the shard embedded in my soul. I hadn’t even realized how violent the act of pulling it out of me was. It was a stabbing, scratching sensation, flowing out from my chest and into my arm. I kept going, silently apologizing, resolving to find a better way now that I knew one existed. It said nothing this time.
This was still just raw flame, not thread. I clenched my fist and told it to tauten and extend. Each individual tongue of flame began to wrap around my arm, thinning out, merging together until it was a shaggy tangle of magic, chaotic but workable. It might have even been called fluffy, if it weren’t so sharp and almost thrashing. The blazing light danced in Ai’s eyes as she watched the form change.
“Good enough. Now watch carefully, please.”
Her hands began to gather the mass and spin it into fine thread that, before now, I had only ever seen through a camera. Her skein wasn’t so much bundled around her forearm as it was…already woven, a sort of glove, or maybe a gauntlet—an artful preparatory step that I had no idea how to even begin. I flashed back to yesterday’s stream, how Bri had prepared her own thread, and then to that moment in the car, my arm wreathed with flame. There was a connection there, but I had hardly even thought to examine that part of the process, nor had any of my resources covered it. My perspective had been so limited, so focused on the glyphs themselves. She brought her hand to my arm and tugged. I made a sound, a coughing gasp. It felt like she had pulled on my collarbones hard enough to bend them, a sharp ache of protesting bone. That pain passed quickly, and the sensation afterward wasn’t nearly as scorching as last time, more of a suffusing warmth.
Ai locked eyes with Ebi for a moment. Then they both began at once, the tattoo gun injecting glimmering ink into my skin as she unthreaded the old weave. As she did, she brought the new one into its place. With literal thread, this procedure was either difficult or impossible—but this was all sort of a metaphor for a magical and somewhat abstract process to begin with.
The process was patient and methodical, instead of the frenzied, bare seconds I had taken to throw together my own version. That time, the fraying twine had been actively burning me as it came apart in my hands, so speed had been of the essence. This time, with proper thread, there was no need to rush, and there was time to appreciate the moment and take in the details. I noticed her nails were painted—had Hina’s been? I couldn’t remember. Each nail was a different color—I realized it corresponded to her team. Pearly white, azure, verdant green, violet, dark green with red flecks. Cute.
There was also a small tattoo running along her right index finger and down the back of her hand, regularly demarcated. A ruler—a bit redundant and imprecise for a machinist who had access to real metrology equipment of mechanical, electronic, and magical varieties. Maybe it was symbolic—then I saw the lattice it bound. Rather, I didn’t quite see the lattice, but I knew it was there. That was some kind of measuring tool, maybe a caliper, bound to her body for easy access like she was binding my spear to mine. Her eyes followed mine.
“Bindings are easier for me than snapweaving.”
The rest of the world and the throbbing in my head fell away as I watched them work, Ai’s hands twisting and tugging and refining as she pulled. She was clearly in the zone herself, both the timid apologeticism and tough leadership forgotten. I wondered how long it would take me to be able to work the thread as she could. Was this how she had made Ebi, sitting next to a vacant chassis, losing hours weaving life into being that stretched into weeks, maybe months, until one day some last thread of the lattice was pulled into place and flame had crystallized into consciousness? To what extent were they linked? Ebi herself was precise as one would expect, imitating the shape of my old scar with the ink—it didn’t hurt, thanks to the anesthetic.
Ai was almost as close to me as Hina had been, but the energy was different. Where my encounter with Hina had been alien and unfamiliar, heart-poundingly intense, this procedure was a familiar setting. I had plenty of experience with this kind of contact from equally attractive surgeons and nurses in the months it had taken to recover function in my other arm, and had long since gotten over embarrassment in that context, by necessity. That’s not to say I didn’t find Ai attractive, but it was the kind of idle aesthetic appreciation I could compartmentalize as that of a caretaker, almost motherly; somebody I wanted to be friends with. And we had a connection in the form of our shared nature as flamebearers. Unfortunately—
“I can’t see what you’re doing differently. Um—something in how you’re pulling it?”
Was it something in the motion of her hand? The way she had prepared the spool? She was certainly more skilled than me—but it felt like she was looking for a deeper answer than that.
“Close. Do you know why it came from your hand?”
This was taking on the air of a lesson.
“Because—those are my burns from last time?”
That stopped her short, and she frowned at me.
“Last time?”
Ebi said something to her in Japanese, and her eyes widened. “You’re second contact. So it can happen. That—I’m sorry. Let’s start over. Why does hurting it work?”
“Because…it’s alive.”
That was fairly well-understood about the Flame. It wasn’t a being per se, but it was alive in some way, and living creatures tended to avoid pain—but she shook her head. “That’s the misconception. Why does blood magic work?”
“Sacrifice. Because—” my stomach dropped. “The magic seeks pain. So when we hurt it—”
It was so horribly obvious, framed like that. The conversation until now had felt profane; this was outright blasphemous, unholy. She nodded in a small way, looking down at the spool on her arm. “Pain is…food. Motivation. It loves to feel, and pain is strong—its own, or the bearer’s. It doesn’t actually care which, as far as I can tell.”
Blood magic wasn’t my area of expertise, but I understood the principle well enough. It had taken more of my foot than I had intended because the Flame—or some other force related to it—had decided that what I was asking the magic to do required more pain for equilibrium to be maintained.
“But—so there’s another option? You said you didn’t use sanguimancy.”
“The Flame likes pain because it’s—powerful. Red ripple is…yoku tsukaeru. Very usable.”
That it was. Pain was overwhelming, all-consuming. Nothing else mattered; it eclipsed all, and so in terms of ripple—how much something ‘matters’, magically speaking—it was powerful. Ai twisted one of her hands around her thumb, working a loop into the thread. She teased it until the tension was right, then went on.
“It doesn’t only like pain. What it really wants is ripple, and there’s more colors than red, and other kinds of red ripple anyway. We’re mahou shoujo, so we feed ours with good emotions. Trust, hope. Kindness. The desire to do good.”
I didn’t need translation to know she had said ‘magical girls’. I was seeing the downside, cynical as it was. “Weaker than pain.”
I had been saved once—twice now, actually, so I was a pretty decent case study there. The first time, my gratitude had been utterly drowned in the pain of my charred hand. The second time, the pain had prevented me from being able to experience gratitude in the moment, because I had literally passed out. She sighed.
“That’s the trade-off.”
Ebi cut in, looking bored with the conversation. “They’re supposed to only use good emotions.”
“Meaning?”
“Sometimes they make compromises to do what they have to. That’s what I meant by sacrifice.”
The robot let that hang. It wasn’t delivered with any acid, but Ai still seemed stung by the remark. I looked between the two, and while I was sure there was drama and history there, my thoughts were going further afield, grander in scale, to the basis of my obsession.
“But the Vaetna are so powerful. They can’t be—”
“I don’t know. It’s either pain, or whatever they do—doesn’t follow the rules. I’d like to think it’s the second one.”
Nightmarish. If they were performing blood magic, they sure didn’t show it—which meant they were instead hurting their flame, which was inconceivable, too horrible, a violation of what the Spire stood for, what I believed in. So I had to agree with Ai—but they had all but made the rules for how I understood magic, between glyphs and modern understanding of ripple. So if they were operating on different rules…she saw my turmoil.
“You’re second contact. You might also be breaking the rules. So—let’s go back to why it came from your hand. These are…inferno scars?”
“The very first day of the firestorms.”
“That would—your memories of that pain are probably a…lens, a focus. You already associate them with the Flame, so it’s drawn to manifest there. That’s just a guess, but…the Vaetna might be like that too, in some way.”
Elation rose in me. It was just a blind guess, because of how little we knew of them, but—“Are you saying I’m more powerful?”
It felt too good to be true. After all these years, I was actually special? Destined for more, somehow twice-flametouched or otherwise able to transcend the system Ai had laid out?
“Impossible to say, yet. We’ll benchmark you when you’re more recovered. But after that…maybe you should go to the Spire to learn from them, not stay at Toudai.”
“I want to. I always have. But the way Hina put it—I’m a prisoner.”
She sighed. “The others don’t think so. I think this is all going to become a mess. You’re safe here, but…Hina-san and Takehara-san want to recruit you. For different reasons, I think.”
She saw the naked worry on my face. “But…don’t they both…”
“Yes. They do. Hina-san is selfish, like I said. So is Takehara-san—Opal—in her own way. But they’re good people. They’re still mahou shoujo. Takehara-san more than any of us. You can trust her.”
We lapsed back into silence until they were done. I couldn’t bring up the fact that my Flame had spoken to me, or the implications thereof. I would, in time, but I was still reeling from it all. I was ashamed of how little I knew of what had come up in this conversation; for all my understanding of glyphcraft, of ripple, this aspect had hardly ever come up. The various VNT groups out there in the world seemed to play it close to their chest, which made me feel a little better for not knowing, but I felt I had been so blind.
In my flame-sense, I could feel the new portions of the lattice, crisp and taut, and where my old work remained, deemed good enough and perhaps kept in as a matter of sentimentality. Visually, the anchor had changed as well. The burn scar had been replaced by a shimmering tattoo, like a foil card. It was darker than my pale skin around it, making it stand out far more, brilliant as it caught the light. The word ‘ripple’ rose to mind—I supposed that was appropriate. It stung, but it was mundane pain, and it faded as soon as Ebi applied some kind of cream. I imagined how much better my burns could have healed if that kind of medical technology was available seven years ago—then again, my foot was apparently beyond repair, and by all accounts it was basically the same kind of burn.
Despite not doing any of the work, I was exhausted, and both of them could see it. She still insisted I give it a try. I focused, pressed on the lattice—no pain, no gash, just the spear in my hand. I could feel the improved weave. I retracted the spear, the motion feeling more natural than ever. Was this how it felt for Heung?
I called and put it away a few more times. It was so much more responsive and elegant, and I was almost giddy with the lack of pain—it occurred to me that I should thank her. I looked up at Ai sheepishly, trying to hold the eye contact.
“Thank you.”
That was for the binding, and my foot, and the insight. I felt I didn’t deserve any of it.
“It’s good?”
“It is.”
She lit up. It was almost a transformation. She hadn’t literally mantled—but she looked so much better than before as she inspected her work. Despite the darkness of the conversation, she seemed lighter, healthier in some abstract way. In some way, she was being nourished by the act of helping me—is that what she had meant by using positive emotions to power her magic? Behind her eyes was a passion and a joy in magic that affirmed the sense of kinship I had felt with her.
She saw me off with thanks of her own, more apologies for the near-chin-floor incident, and a promise.
“If you want to stay—I still don’t think you should, but if you do—I’ll try to teach you how we do it. It doesn’t have to hurt.”
What did you say to that? I mumbled another thank-you, starting to be a little overwhelmed by the slightly unfamiliar social rituals.
“Um. Okay. Thanks. And thanks for the—foot, too? When that happens.”
She smiled. “No problem.”
Evidently satisfied with the end of the interaction, Ebi provided escape for me, carting me away. The journey back to my room was still mildly humiliating on principle, but we once again encountered nobody as we reached the elevator ride back to Ebi’s domain on the 18th floor. Besides, I was focused entirely inward, thinking about what had passed between us and the thing attached to my soul.
I knew for a fact Ai wasn’t a pacifist and was having trouble reconciling the experience I just had with the violence I knew Lighthouse traded in. That dissonance now loomed even larger in my mind when it came to the Vaetna. It had never bothered me before; they were just so much more, and very open about the way their violence intersected with their humanitarianism…but now I wasn’t so sure. If the greatest power lay in pain, and they were the undisputed most powerful magic-users in the world…I didn’t like the implications of that. At least it was gated behind several ‘if’s. If they even operated on the same rules the rest of us flamebearers did, if the sheer scale of their humanitarianism didn’t factor into their magic somehow…and so on.
With Lighthouse, on the other hand, I was certain that this leveraging of pain was part of how they operated, from Ai’s own mouth. It felt a little like their sunny public image was a mask—or at least, more aspirational than genuine, chasing the image of magical girls while trafficking in cruelty, not that I had much basis for knowing what the ‘true nature of magical girls’ should instead be. The impression was amplified by the physical features I kept noticing, absent in promotional material. But Ai seemed alright, on my wavelength. By the time the elevator came to a stop, I had recovered enough social energy to ask.
“About, uh, positive emotions, and what you said about compromises. Are they…real?”
“They’re trying.”
A rather enigmatic answer—but enough so that it felt honest, so perhaps it was the best she could have given. I was still uncertain, rattled by the encounter with Sapphire, mentally contrasting her with Ai again, danger against safety. I returned to those moments with the hyena once more, and a pattern dawned on me. She had told me three times in the space of five minutes that I should let Ai work on my binding. Had that been her way of showing she cared, knowing that this was what Ai needed? What I needed, even? Had she been expecting me to broach that topic, see the other perspective? I quietly readjusted my evaluation of the Sapphire Radiance. Perhaps I ought to trust Ai’s confidence in her character, such as it was.
I was tired, thoughts aswirl with doubts and uncertainties, but I always had energy for my friends. The chatroom was generally a zone where I could recharge and recover my social battery. I was also chattier here, among my longtime friends.
ezzen: Guess who just met Emerald. Sapphire, too.
starstar97: FUCK OFF
starstar97: im literally this close to buying tickets to tokyo
starstar97: i know where you live.
That threw me, just a bit. Did I live here now? Ebi chuckled, reading over my shoulder. I reflexively hid my phone for a moment before remembering that they evidently already knew about my online identity.
ezzen: Huh. I guess you do.
ezzen: Come visit!
starstar97: how dare you call my bluff
starstar97: no moneys oTL
starstar97: what are they like
“How much am I allowed to say?”
“Oh, everyone important already knows what Sapphire is like. Go nuts.”
“It won’t reach the tabloids?”
“Won’t it?” There was a smile in her voice.
ezzen: Sapphire scares me. She’s like Sahan levels of intense, but she moves like Hueng.
DendriteSpinner: Saph? Scary? Shes the cuddly one right
starstar97: you barely keep up with this stuff dendrite
starstar97: yeah shes the cuddly one
starstar97: but also famously the crazy one
ezzen: ty for confirming lol
ezzen: Emerald…
ezzen: Gets it? Hard to explain but
ezzen: She reminds me of Mayari maybe?
ezzen: She gave me a tattoo.
I looked at Ebi, the one who had actually wielded the tattoo gun. A robot of decidedly mysterious origins, supposedly Ai’s creation—indubitably a person, but outside of what science had understood to be possible. How had she come about? Actually, that was too…clinical, too focused on what she was rather than who she was. I ought to have some empathy, repay that which she and Ai had shown me. So—what was her life even like?
“Do you ever get out?”
She shrugged. “Legally, I don’t exist.”
I looked down at the chatroom on my phone, the social lifeline I had had for six and a half years of otherwise near-total isolation. I would have gone insane without it, probably. I raised my gaze to the empty halls and rooms of the 18th floor. Her situation, this barren domain devoid of companionship, was oddly nostalgic in a way that was more than a little painful. I felt obligated to offer it to her in turn, showing her the screen.
“Do you want to—join?”
She seemed genuinely confused by the question. “What, your chatroom?”
“Yeah. You’re sort of secret, right? You’ve got ‘forbidden secret project’ written all over you, and I’ve never seen you in any videos or anything.”
I gestured around the liminal space of the hallway for emphasis. She crossed her arms, mint-green chassis illuminated from above by the bluer light of her digital face frowning at me.
“You think I don’t have friends. This is pity. You’re pitying me.”
I blushed, having been mostly-correctly called out—empathy, not pity, though the difference could be pretty immaterial—but soldiered on. “Well…do you?”
“I have the Radiances.”
“And all the other staff? They’d figure out what’s up with you if you talked with them too much.”
“I am not permitted to address this line of questioning. Please consult with Radiance Emerald for further inquiries. Have a nice day.”
Her customer-service smile was sunny—no, solar, blinding. I was rather unmoved.
“Nice impression.”
“Thanks. No, I suppose I don’t really get out much. I mean, I’ve poked around on the forums, just like everybody else who works for Todai. But no.”
“So what do you do in your free time?”
That was an unusual question for someone like me to ask—but I was trying to figure out if she was an internet-creature like myself. That digital face made a smug smile.
“Online classes at the other Todai. Want to know how many degrees I have?”
“Humor me.”
“Working on my sixth.”
As someone who had effectively vanished from formal education after year nine and coasted through the remainder of secondary school with barely passing grades and minimum attendance—I couldn’t imagine that. I was a rather hard worker when it came to my own study of magic, but school simply hadn’t worked for me. I did some mental math in my head. Even with the most generous estimate of her age—
“Multiple, simultaneously?”
“Yep. Fake names, all that. So I keep busy enough.”
Too busy for friends, is what it sounded like to me. Maybe that was a little hypocritical, but even I had more social connections, if only online. She seemed content with what she had. That was disappointing, in a weird way, and we fell silent as we returned to the room I had woken up in. Attempt failed.
She deposited me, gave my IV and vitals a once over, and walked—almost a glide—back toward the door.
“Going to get you lunch and do my rounds. See that spray bottle?”
“Yeah. Disinfectant?”
My wound was probably due for a cleaning, if it was healing anything like my arm’s burns had. Ebi shook her head.
“Water. Spritz Hina if she shows up while I’m gone.”
“That works?”
“Well enough.”
She turned to leave the room, and I wanted to call out, to make one last push for connection with someone who I could almost consider a friend in this new place—but the words didn’t make it to my lips. I just lay there as she left, ashamed at the failed invitation. I had never been good at making friends, and it seemed I wasn’t about to start now, for all I felt I had forged some small connection with Ai earlier.
Alone, in that desolate room on that desolate floor. Maybe Ebi could bear it, but for me, it called forth the loneliness unearthed by my encounter with Sapphire. I had thought I had made peace with my lifestyle—but one crumb of interaction, a handful of face-to-face conversations with pretty girls and mysterious robots, and suddenly I hated being alone again. If Hina had shown up then, I might have just let her do what she wanted, if only for someone to talk to and feel close against my body, damn the spray bottle or the danger. But she didn’t, which was equal parts relieving and disappointing. What complicated emotions she inspired in me.
Thanks to her and Ai and Ebi, maybe things would be different from now on, however long I stayed here. But for now, at this moment? More of the same, just me and an empty room. I sighed. Well, even if ‘Dalton’ was perennially secluded—today’s events excepted—‘Ezzen’ never was. I sighed, reaching for my social lifeline once again. It really was a shame Ebi didn’t want to join. I rather felt she’d belong.
So imagine my surprise when the first thing I saw upon opening the chatroom was:
ebi-furai: o/
Author’s Note:
Thanks to Softies, Zak, Maria, and Cassiopeia for beta reading.
Join the Discord to discuss the story and hang out with other Sunspot readers!
Join the Patreon to support the story and read chapters three weeks ahead of public!
What kinds of organizations had the means, motive, and opportunity to abduct a freshly-minted flamebearer directly off the eastbound M4 Motorway in broad daylight?
The list was depressingly long. The Vaetna could, in theory, although that went against their modus operandi. At the other end of the spectrum—at least in the public perception—were the shadowy paramilitary groups and cults oriented around the reappropriation of Frozen Flame shards, to use for themselves or to sell to the highest bidder. However, between the two and often conspicuously overlooked by the media lay the NATO Paranatural Control Task Force. Ostensibly, the PCTF’s main job was to crack down on unauthorized magic and help handle rogue infernos from flamefall gone sour, from a more established “world police” geopolitical position than the young rogue nation that was the Spire. They were actually pretty competent at that, too. They were styled as the peacekeepers for this era of magic; their nickname had gone from “PCs” to “PeeCees” and at last to “Peacies.”
But they were also the American hegemony’s apparatus for hunting and harvesting the flame which fed magical research in the West. An ugly, ugly thing, not only responsible for extralegal black-baggings of flamebearers but also known to have fingers in the pie of basically any Western research in magic outside the Spire. In the UK, they could and did operate with near-impunity, being largely above the law “as a matter of international security” and other familiar buzzwords about counterterrorism and so on, the signs of a broader slide toward fascism that the Spire’s emergence had only blunted. They were also, arguably, more well-resourced than the Spire in terms of manpower and funding, if less gifted in magic by an order of magnitude—and critically, more physically local around here than any Spire assets. They actually had a base right next to Heathrow as part of a five-year-long Mexican standoff with the Vaetna—but also to intercept people doing exactly what I was: fleeing for the haven that was the Gate.
All this was not to say the PCTF was particularly evil; their bones came from the then-young initiatives that had helped me recover from the inferno that had taken my dad, and that was still a core part of their role, an international response to an indiscriminate natural disaster. But the rumors persisted, half-verified accounts of facilities where uncooperative flamebearers had their flame extracted and used. The positive spin on it was that research needed resources, and not all research was strictly for weapons; advances in medical magitech had been revolutionary even in only six years. Advances mostly limited to the rich, though.
The important part was that at the moment, they were a mortal threat to my freedom and probably my life.
To their credit, the way they got me was remarkably non-disruptive to the various travelers and commuters sharing the motorway with us. No car chase or helicopters appearing overhead, no bullet splattering the cabbie’s grey matter against the dashboard. He simply pulled off the freeway and killed the engine. I protested, but I already knew what was happening, and couldn’t really blame him despite the spike of adrenaline entering my blood. It wasn’t proper mind control—that didn’t exist—just a telepathic broadcast of orders backed up by the implicit threat of violence. After a moment, they targeted me too.
“FLAMEBEARER.” THIS IS A PCTF RESCUE MESSAGE. EXIT THE VEHICLE AND LAY ON THE GRASS. COOPERATE AND YOU WILL NOT BE HARMED.
Rescue. I would have laughed if I wasn’t busy trying to not hyperventilate. “Cooperate and you will not be harmed” was gallows humor on the forums regarding the treatment of flamebearers. It was terrifying to have those words now directed at me. All of these organizations, sans the Spire and a handful of equally esoteric outliers, intended to harm us; it was just a matter of when and how. Maybe they’d directly take the flame from my soul, maybe they’d just lock me up and use me as a battery for blood mages to wield their craft. Maybe they’d be civil, offer me tea and a chance to work for them—but I would be party to those first two options. I liked to think of magic as amoral, a tool to be used for good or ill—even flamefalls were just natural disasters, as random as being hit by a meteor—but even I had to admit the breadth of evidence that the externalities were measured in the suffering of people with whom I now shared a label.
I stayed in the car, not so much an act of defiance as simply being overwhelmed by panic. What could I do? I hadn’t been idle while riding in the backseat of the cab; I had scrawled some more glyphs that might plausibly aid my escape, but I had close to zero confidence in using them in an actual life-and-death combat situation. Even if I could control the magic well enough in the moment, could I—would I—kill somebody?
REPEAT: EXIT THE VEHICLE AND LAY ON THE GRASS. COOPERATE AND YOU WILL NOT BE HARMED.
I knew I wouldn’t really get the chance to find out whether I was up to the task of murder, face-to-face. If I didn’t comply, they’d probably hit me with some combination of subsonics and magic to make me pass out—more likely comatose—and then just grab me anyway, standard crowd control stuff. That they hadn’t already done so was probably more of an indication that they weren’t quite in position yet, rather than of unwillingness or mercy. That meant that I had a currently closing window to try to make a break for it on foot, or maybe even hijack the cab. The former would lead to a foot chase through the woods flanking this stretch of road, and led us down the rest of the flowchart anyway. The latter was objectively insane.
So—other options. Could I hide? They already had a lock on me in some way, and any additional use of magic would just make more ripple by which to track me, so no. Negotiation? Probably not. This tended to only end one way, barring a fight or interference—
My phone buzzed. I scrambled to get it out, hands shaking.
skychicken: stall 3 min
I stared at the message, seriously lost for words. I looked around, out the car’s windows, as though expecting to see someone relaying my situation. Stall for what? Had he managed to call the goddamned Vaetna? My mental machinery restarted after a very long moment—precious time lost—and jumped into top gear. How could I stall? I was above using the poor cabbie as a hostage—again, not that I was really sure I could bring myself to do that in the first place. In fact—
“You should probably get out.”
I was a little surprised that he hadn’t yet, actually, if only because in his position I would have also been thinking along the lines of hostages. It had happened before. He twisted in his seat and looked at me, a gravelly face for an equally gravelly voice.
“That’s what I ought to tell you.”
I blinked at him. A strange exasperation rose in me, separate from the life-and-death panic. “Fuck no. What’s it to you?”
“You’ll steal my car.”
He was visibly uncomfortable at the prospect of having a walking inferno in his car. I decided to press on that. “Do you want me to take you hostage?”
He flinched. “The Peacies would save me.”
Ridiculous, to be honest—how much faith did he have in them? They weren’t even here yet. I could kill him right now, in theory, not that I would. I could, however, go for intimidation. I held up my arm—not the one with the spear-mark. My right, the one with the old burn scars wrapping around it like a leathery glove, almost to the elbow. I showed it to him and did my best snarl. “How do you think I got this?”
The intended effect was to make myself appear as some kind of hardened veteran flamebearer who had been doing this for years, rather than the terrified, somewhat overwhelmed kid, flametouched not an hour ago. It was pretty much this or attempt to pull out the spear in the confined space of the car—patently ridiculous—or spend precious mental energy on weaving a simple spell just for intimidation.
It did the trick. He scrambled out of the car, and I locked the doors behind him and refocused on the plan, pulling out my notebook and scrawling another glyph. Another first-order fully representable in 2D, another game-changer application of magic that laughed at the laws of physics. The lattice was a square inlaid with dots that concentrated toward the corners, surrounded by some parabolic swoops. I tore out the page and sat on it, then yanked the fire from my chest like I was starting a lawnmower.
Fuck me, that hurt. I was reasonably sure I had actually pulled a muscle or something. I made an ugly groaning noise as the flame twisted into the rough twine of lattice-able magic, and I pushed it into the glyph. I hoped that eventually the pain would become more manageable with practice—but at least the actual weaving was almost trivial when I had an actual glyph upon which to structure the lattice. As it was, the spell went off fine. What had I cast?
{AFFIX}
In essence, I had essentially glued my arse to the car. Stupid, low-tech, but a pretty potent metaphysical anchoring. It wasn’t like sewing my jeans to the car seat, it was a more fundamental attachment of ‘me’ to ‘the car’. They would have to either break the magic or physically cut apart the car to extract me; making me pass out wouldn’t undo it. Or they could torture me until I gave in and undid the magic on my own. I shoved aside the unpleasant thought; there was no time.
REPEAT: EXIT THE VEHICLE AND LAY ON THE GRASS. COOPERATE AND YOU WILL NOT BE HARMED.THIS IS YOUR FINAL WARNING.
Fuck off. I didn’t know telepathy, but spite cost me nothing…though I probably wouldn’t be brave enough to say that in person if it came to that. How long had it been? A minute?
Back to the magic. That had been the easy part. Next, defense. Arguably, if this worked, the butt-gluing was mostly redundant, but this one was going to hurt and I felt better having something already in place for if I passed out.
To put my spear into my arm, I had {COMPOSED} the concept of ‘the spear’ onto the concept of ‘the (blood-space) on my arm’. Very abstract, very useful, very flexible—very difficult and dangerous to do on objects you’re currently sitting inside. Folding matter and space like that is the kind of thing it’s hilariously easy to kill yourself with if you make a mistake, telefragging some object directly inside you or shifting a slice of the space your body was occupying. I had needed blood magic to help stabilize the process the first time, creating a gap in my body for the spear to fill.
I glimpsed motion in the rearview mirror and glanced up to see an SUV pulling off the road behind me, black and white with unmistakable Peacies yellow accents. Fuck. I had no time to draw another glyph, and I didn’t trust myself to do this blind with the Frozen Flame alone; blood magic would again have to make up the difference. I could live without a few toes, maybe. Easy enough for the Spire to replace. That was a grim thought, but I was in full panic mode at this point, and the adrenaline would hopefully blunt the worst of the pain. There were better ways to do this with a more complex series of glyphs or more refined control of the thread, but I had the capacity for neither and no more time.
I pictured the lattice and started to weave my fraying twine, in my clumsy and unfamiliar way, sloppy and inefficient, working blind, remembering hundreds of times I had seen Vaetna and VNTs do this with elegance and trivial ease in luminous silk. I heard a car door slam shut behind me—forced it out of my mind. Keep weaving, imagine the funnel. Wrap it, pull it around. A tap on the window.
“Please step out of the car, sir.”
I looked at the PCTF operative, more military in appearance than police. Actually, it was more like an exoskeletal bomb suit, two and a half meters tall, aglow with magical enhancement and reinforcement. Something designed to withstand the full force of what I could throw at him, a stripped-down version of what had once been used to fight Vaetna. The precaution was reasonable, too; to him, I must have looked like a wild animal, hunted, cornered, face aglow in the white light of the thread I wove, some crazed spell surely intended to burn us all to ash. A manic grin spread across my face as the power of the Frozen Flame surged through me. Decidedly uncharacteristic, but in that moment, I held the cards.
“Make me.”
And I buried the car. Down, down—not that far down. Four meters from where it had been? Enough to be well and truly buried, but not into the bedrock or anything, nor deep enough that the soil would cause the windows or roof to collapse—I hoped. For a moment, my connection to the lattice made me aware that a dirt copy of the car sat where the real one just had. Then the magic broke, and it crumbled.
As did I. Screaming pain. I howled in the claustrophobic darkness, completely blind. Hot tears ran down my cheeks, burning compared to the icy aftershock of the magic pulsing through my head, one of the many chaotic side effects of magic cast with no regard for ripple. If that had been all, it would have been fine, compared to the alternative. But that had not been all—I had paid a far higher blood price than I had expected. I had sort of ‘offered’ three toes on my right foot, prioritizing them to be severed as a more abstract price than the direct mechanical function that the cut on my arm had served. I had miscalculated the price.
The magic had taken fully half of my right foot. All five toes and the ball of the foot, gone, blood pouring into the sock already. Some hazy part of my mind, drowning under the pain, observed that I would go into shock and bleed out if I didn’t deal with it right now. Once, seven years ago, I had been faced with a similar do-or-die in the face of pain so severe it obliterated all else—and I had failed.
Not this time. I refused. Despite the agony and the moaning sobs of incoherent suffering, I yanked the shoe off, and then the sock, slick blood coating my hands. I couldn’t bring myself to feel at the wound to determine the nature of the damage; I might pass out if I touched it, and then I was dead.
The bleeding had to stop. I called upon the Frozen Flame once more to perform its most basic nature. I focused through the pain, on the pain, demanding fire, so fundamental it had no glyph, no word in magic. I blubbered anyway.
“Fire. Give me fire.”
Nothing but my ichor trickling into the darkness. Had I just killed myself? All that to bleed out down here in the dark before any rescue could arrive?
“Flame. Please. Make it—go—away.”
It had killed my father, marred my body with its passage. It had been so beautiful in spite of that, transcendent, the spark of obsession. All those years holed up in my room, learning, idolizing, hoping—and now it had returned to me, fulfilled my dream. The flame had come to lift me up from the dark, after all I studied and proved that I would be able to wield it like nobody else. I was worthy.
But now, in this moment, when I needed it most—no fire came. This box was the same as things had always been. There was only me, begging for flame in the darkness. This had always been my destiny, an ignominious death as my flesh failed beneath me, true magic taunting me from beyond my grasp, unfettered by glyphs to bind it. At least let it end in fire, like how it had taken Dad.
“You can’t leave me like this. You—can’t. You chose me.”
The Frozen Flame didn’t respond. It didn’t care, of course.
Something animal inside me turned to seething rage, fueled by the torment and my looming mortality—and a sense of betrayal. How could it turn its back on me now? I flailed for the only thing that had allowed me to escape the pain before, when I had been flametouched—it brought more pain as the flesh was torn from my arm. But what was one more match in the inferno? I raised the spear as I had before. The darkness was claustrophobic, but also made the space around me seem vast and endless. Perhaps I wasn’t holding the real spear at all, and this was within my mind once again.
It all made a horrific, twisted kind of sense, the same awful perspective from before. The Frozen Flame was not an ally, barely even a weapon. It was an animal to be tormented, corralled, put to work. It struck people at random, and it was kill or be killed, control or be controlled. Except it did not fear death as we did—it would find a new Flamefall, a new host. It feared only pain. In that, it was like me. No wonder the PCTF treated us how it did.
My thoughts at the time weren’t nearly so rational or organized; I only made these connections after. I just wanted the pain to stop, and the most primitive part of me understood that inflicting pain—revenge—in turn upon this thing inside me would make that happen. So I seized my fate and stabbed.
Then, and only then, did I hear them again.
Doesn’t know any better—pain begets pain—why won’t you trust us?
Trust?
Flame burst from me, lighting up the interior of the car, the pooled blood reflecting an unearthly white above the crimson, casting flickering shadows impossibly dark. It had not ignited from my chest—the scars on my right arm were the source, a gauntlet of fire, a surefire sign that our first encounter seven years ago was somehow related to now. In that bleaching light, I saw the source of the agony: the front of my foot had been perfectly severed, as though sliced in a singular stroke by the blade of some chthonic arbiter. I hesitated for one eternal second, the animal part of me now cowering and cringing at the prospect of even more suffering. Then I grabbed the stump, and every sensation was overwhelmed by burning. I’m sure I screamed; the Peacies up above might have even heard it through meters of earth. Then everything went dark—well, even darker—and unconsciousness took me.
I would have died of oxygen deprivation, down there in the pitch blackness of the metal tomb I had made for myself, had Sky’s promised aid not come. I was obviously not aware of what had happened up above, nor how I was extracted from the dirt. But I was indeed rescued.
Just not by the Spire.
—
I stand at the edge of a vast body of water. The surface is frozen; there is movement below, brief sparks of light shooting across the depths. The shore I stand on is sandy—I turn and see a forest, trees impossibly tall, continuing out toward the mist shrouding either horizon, held back only by the narrow stretch of beach that matches it all the way across. The mist penetrates the trees as well, a gloom to confound all who enter.
The forest has no name, but I know the sea, so I walk off the beach and onto the ice. I look down through it. It is clear, and shiny, and I see my reflection staring back up at me. We lock eyes for a moment, and I wonder how thick the ice is, how hard I would have to strike it to break the barrier between us. A flicker illuminates him from below, another light from the depths that vanishes as quickly as it appeared. I return to scanning the horizon for something, anything. But there is only the sea, the beach, and the forest. Even the sky is empty, no sun or clouds.
Something thumps below my feet. I look down again and realize half of my foot is missing, bleeding onto the ice. It is a distant, abstract realization, not one of pain or even concern. The blood dyes the ice red, seeping down and through and into the water. The lights below come closer, circling, inspecting, snapping at one another. Not all are the same. Some are coils of luminous silk, others more like schools of pinpoints swarming together. A few are not creatures of their own at all, but merely appendages of something else, sent up from the inky depths to investigate.
Another thump, and the ice cracks.
—
I awoke in a bed, as I usually did. Not my bed, though, a hospital bed. A nice hospital bed, the kind of high-tech ICU that had benefited the most from magic’s arrival in the world. IVs and monitoring equipment shared room with bandages inscribed with complex interlinked glyphs, a few I recognized as second- or third-order as the fogginess of sleep retreated, things like {SUSTAIN} and {REVITALISE}. So whoever had me also had access to Frozen Flame magic. That boded somewhat poorly; I would have rather woken up in an entirely mundane hospital—or a ditch. I didn’t have the energy to be afraid.
Nothing hurt, which was testament to both the magic and the morphine. I gingerly began to move my limbs, which were being somewhat stubborn, asserting that they preferred to remain where they were. I eventually managed to extract my left arm and checked my forearm—my spear was there, which led me to a few observations.
First, I wasn’t cuffed or anything. I guessed they either trusted me to not cause a mess or trusted the magic to keep me from causing a mess. Fortunately for everyone, I wasn’t feeling very inclined to cause a mess until I knew who had me.
Second, they hadn’t siphoned the Frozen Flame from me, which filled me with…a modicum of relief. There had been a real chance that they could have just torn the magic from my soul and then released me back into the wild like a shark being hunted solely for its fin, forever crippled. Maybe that would have been better for the both of us. I hadn’t forgotten, this time.
Third—why was the IV drip labeled in Japanese? Some pieces began to come together in my brain, analytical and historical mind taking the stage while the emotional centers were exhausted.
When the Frozen Flame had first made its presence known, the immediate cultural comparison had been to superpowers. The Vaetna’s appearance and general disposition had compounded this, until they had made it quite, quite clear that for all their benevolence and general goodwill they were not classic paragon superheroes. They were associated with the Spire as a political entity in a way that the idealized superhero wasn’t—plus the armor and focus on bladed weaponry, it might be more accurate to call them knights. Of course, that didn’t stop people like me from being rabid fans, especially if we deeply identified with the Spire’s cause.
For other groups that harnessed the Frozen Flame, the zeitgeist had shifted somewhat. Cults cropping up around or otherwise worshiping Flamebearers were relatively common, but stranger groups also existed, especially outside of the Western metaculture. In this case, Japan had its own reference points for superhuman abilities and magic, and that had had very direct consequences on the way the Frozen Flame was both viewed and harnessed in east Asia.
Four years ago, a flamebearer and an anonymous Japanese billionaire had come to an agreement…or at least, it was assumed to be an agreement. Who knew what really had gone on behind closed doors. Regardless, they had given up their flame, distributed it, and in doing so had created—
A team of magical girls.
It hadn’t really been creation ex nihilo; the girls had been doing it since more or less the start of the age of magic, during the chaotic period of the firestorms, when there were few central organizations equipped to deal with flamefall. This had just made it official, given them resources and real notoriety. The Vaetna had generally been supportive and congratulatory, as had the world at large. It had all the elements of good PR—a willing sacrifice of personal power toward a greater goal, a collective ideal that was pretty unilaterally positive and emphasized doing good in the world, and a generally cleaner image than the Spire’s complicated and at times bloodsoaked humanitarianism-by-the-sword stance.
They were called Lighthouse, or Todai. Confusingly, ‘Todai’ was also a name for Tokyo University, but that had been part of the pun they had been founded on—all five members had been Tokyo U students at the time.
What was I doing in their medical ward? I felt it was a fairly safe bet that these had been Sky’s contact, which raised its own questions about how well-connected he was. Speaking of which, I fumbled for my phone, and was further relieved that it hadn’t been confiscated. I had…a lot of unread messages. I opened up the chatroom.
ezzen: I live, apparently.
starstar97: thank fuck
starstar97: its been a mess out there
starstar97: prove its you! whats the peak ripple ever recorded from one of heungs dives?
skychicken: lay off star, it’s them
ezzen: 96-orange over 3-silver. Do I need to also recount the pulse?
starstar97: yep its them lol :DDDDDD
starstar97: sky said you didnt make it to the spire
starstar97: but hes been very cagey about where you DID end up
ezzen: Can I share?
skychicken: youre as safe as youre gonna get other than the spire. so its your call
skychicken: not to overly show my hand but sapphire owes me a favor or two 😛
starstar97: :ooooo you literally never get less mysterious
starstar97: you doin ok e?
ezzen: Mostly…Hold on. I need to check something.
I slowly, gingerly, tried to move my toes, confirming what I had felt and seen in that momentary firelight.
ezzen: Let’s say I could be doing better.
ezzen: I am now the proud owner of only 15 digits.
starstar97: O.O
moth30: oh cool ez is alive lemme backscroll
moth30: what the fuck
starstar97: e what does that mean
moth30: WHAT THE FUCK
ezzen: Ok so to summarize
ezzen: I got caught by the PCTF
ezzen: Escaped, but had to do a liiiiiiiittle sanguimancy.
ezzen: And lost the front half of my right foot.
ezzen: Not entirely sure how I got here, actually.
moth30: feels like you should be more fucked up about this
ezzen: Pretty sure that’s the drugs. We’ll see o.O
starstar97: DDDDDD:
ezzen: Hold on, nurse is here.
At least, I assumed that the short, slender robot was the nurse. I wondered which Radiance’s magic was animating this one.
“Good afternoon, Mr. Colliot.”
Great, they knew my last name. And presumably everything else about me.
“Dalton is, uh, fine.”
I was more than a little thrown off by its appearance. In a mercifully non-anime way, its design was sleek and sexless, and its movements had a grace and deft touch that I usually associated with the Vaetna. The smooth, curved panel on the front of its head displayed a distinctly feminine and Japanese face.
“Please call me Ebi. How are you feeling?”
The question felt a little moot; Ebi was surely linked directly into my various vital monitors. I supposed the question was more of a qualitative one.
“Not in much pain. Two out of ten? A bit miffed about my foot. How long have I been here?”
“Seventeen hours, plus two hours in transit from where you were recovered.”
Two hours was a weird number, too long for a single teleport but too short for most conventional transport. It meant either a hypersonic airlift—something Todai probably did have access to—or more likely some kind of series of telehops, given how quickly they had gotten to me in the first place. Britain to Tokyo was not a trivial journey either way. I frowned. That was a lot of resources to spend on one flamebearer, especially now that I had come down from that pain-induced sense of importance and feeling that I was chosen. How much influence did skychicken wield? For a moment I entertained the idea that he was the secret billionaire who had started Lighthouse, but I really felt like we would have seen more hints of that in the years of knowing one another. I stowed that line of suspicion for now.
“And how was I recovered? Or, I guess—why was I taken here and not the Spire?”
“Politics.”
It—she—had said it with such bite that I was absolutely certain she was fully sentient. Had the singularity happened and nobody had noticed?
“You’re—a real AI.”
“Maybe!”
Great, she was screwing with me. A new voice came from outside the room. “I’m here too!”
A woman bounded into the room. I identified her instantly—Hina Suzuki, Radiance Sapphire. Not in uniform or transformation, but still stylishly dressed in a blouse and skirt, hair done up in a way that kept most of it out of the way but still framed her face with soft brown hair. Gorgeous, unsurprisingly; all of the Radiances were distractingly attractive. It was part of their brand. The biggest giveaway of her identity was the impossibly brilliant azure of her eyes, so intense it made the blue sky outside the window grey by comparison. The mark of white ripple, maybe, like the sense of instability Sahan projected onto everything around him by contrast.
She engulfed Ebi in a huge hug and then practically zipped around the room, inspecting everything, before crouching at the foot of my bed, a puppy ready to play. The voice didn’t quite match the face—there was a layer of huskiness, like she was speaking in a lower register than she was used to.
“How’s your foot?”
“It’s…not?”
The vibrant energy vanished from her for a moment, and she gave a single, solemn nod. Then she returned to practically bouncing around the room.
“We’ll work on that. So, so, so soso—you want to know what happened, right? Here’s how it went. We all saw the Flamefall, right? The ripple was so weird, probably ‘cause it went through the camera to hit you, and then the second one a little later was probably that binding on your arm—that’s cool, by the way, you should show Ai when she’s around so she can do it right—and right after I got a message from J—from our friend to come pick you up. I had to dig you out, y’know!”
She paused, tilting her head. The moment dragged on, my habitual inability to maintain eye contact warring with the way my gaze was drawn toward those sapphire irises. She was standing next to my bed, now, seeming entirely disinterested in continuing to speak. It was so awkward—I had to say something.
“Uh, sorry. Didn’t have other ideas.”
She immediately began speaking again. Apparently it had been my turn?
“It was neat! I mean, you would have been screwed without me, but—anyway I was going to take you to the Spire, but then the ripple went all BOOM! and then there were Vaetna and then a Peacie gunship showed up and they almost started shooting at each other but then Sani showed up and started yelling about more flamefalls and—”
She stopped. Squinted at me. “I’m going too fast.”
I rubbed my face. The Vaetna had shown up after all? “Please back up.”
I meant it both in terms of the events and the fact that she had been progressively inching toward me as she talked until she had just been a couple inches away. I was too drugged and rattled from the day’s events—yesterday’s, rather—and some of the other things she had just said to really be embarrassed by the closeness, but she was…a lot.
“Okay, from the beginning. How did you get to where I was so fast?”
She waved her hand. “I was in Dublin for a thing. Wait—you’re not supposed to know that. I didn’t say anything.” She grinned. Ebi facepalmed, a soft clunk. “You’re here because the Spire is kind of a little bit at war now. Maybe.”
I chewed on this for a bit. Still not quite getting an emotional response. Maybe I had broken something inside me when I had used the Flame again, when I had realized the cruelty of what I was doing.
“As in…Dubai levels of ‘at war’? Raising levels?”
“Kinda? Ripple has been going crazy all day. Sani basically said to take you back here until it blows over.”
I nodded slowly at that. This was the second-best outcome, really. “Other flamefalls?”
She bounced, nervous. “Three, right after yours.”
“Where?”
She shook her head, reddish-brown hair going everywhere, not unlike a dog shaking itself dry. “Doesn’t matter. You do.”
I rubbed my face again. She looked expectantly at me—I realized she was prompting me. “How do you mean?”
“You’re unprecedented! Through the camera? Crazy stuff. The Vaetna want to know, too. Everyone does. But that’s for later. For now, get better! We’ll give you a real checkup, for your Light—uh, Flame. We’ll figure out something for your foot, too.”
I processed this. “Alright…the Flame stuff I understand, and I’m grateful, but…even the foot? Taking me across the world? Why?”
Flamebearers were important, valuable, but not that important. She tapped her chin theatrically. Something glinted in her eyes.
“Hmmmm. Why do you think, Ezzen?”
I froze. My mouth went dry. In some ways, I had always hoped for this moment, to be recognized face-to-face for my knowledge and passion for magic and the Vaetna. But the thing leaning over my bed was not a Vaetna, for all the similarities. She had suddenly changed completely, from the excitable puppy to something else. She grinned and leaned in real close. Too close. Her breath tickled my lips. There was something coiled and vicious behind her eyes. Terror gripped me.
“Because we know who you are, and that makes you interesting.”
I shivered, the sudden fear having jarred my emotions back into operation. Her smile was more like bared teeth, fangs for tearing into flesh and crushing bone. I had never seen those in any video or photo of her. Something at the back of my brain recategorized her as a hyena, not a dog. Where had Ebi gone? How could she leave me alone with this…thing? She went on.
“You’ve got magical knowledge on the same level as any of us, and newly come into your Light. And you’ve already passed the two hardest tests that any of us face: you’re still human and still free.”
I wasn’t even sure she was human, for all she wore a woman’s shape. Too many things were just a little off, this close. Aside from the teeth, her eyes were a bit too big; the edges of those blue irises looked almost stitched.
“And you’ve already had close contact with the Flame once. Sorry about your dad, I guess.” There was some real pity in her voice, there, but then the predatory mania returned. “And the way you did it! Stabbing yourself to master the inferno? The blood magic! Cauterizing yourself—controlling your Light directly! Do you have any idea how good at this you could be, with time, with training?”
She practically purred that last word, advancing further on me, sensual and nightmarish despite having never lost that playful edge to her voice. I was paralyzed, prey before something full of teeth. I had felt safer bleeding in the dark. The way I had hurt my Flame to control it, the grand and horrible revelation that this was what magic was for us—this side of her seemed a natural fit for that. She advanced on me even further to whisper in my ear, her body heat a silent temptation—of what? She could kill me in an instant, if she wanted.
“You matter now. The ripple says so, and everyone will know by the time you’re out of here. The war isn’t about you, not yet—but it will be, eventually, once they figure out who you are. You’re a bunch of special things in one package. It’s so exciting.”
Something clicked inside my brain. Why would the Vaetna not have simply taken me back to the Spire? They had a standing policy of asylum for Flamebearers, and it had been obvious I was headed there. And with the way she was acting, this chilling demeanor beneath her peppy veneer—the war? Was I really worth so much? Taken together—the fear sublimated into action, a need to defend myself. My spear was in my hand, the point at her throat, blood dripping from my trembling arm onto the sheets.
“Get away from me.”
It was an empty threat, realistically speaking, but she shed the predatory energy in an instant. She leaned back, cocking her head at the speartip, a friendly dog with too much energy once more.
“Ooh, look at that! Actual…” she snapped her fingers, searching for the word, the first time she had seemed anything but completely fluent. “Ripple warping? That sounds right.” Her eyes ran down the haft to look at the gash on my arm. For a moment, the monster was back again, looking at the wound downright amorously. “Seriously, ask Ai to fix that for you. We can get a proper tat binding for that in like half an hour.”
“You abducted me.” I practically choked the words out.
She shrugged. “What? Nah. It was a rescue!”
“Then why not the Spire?” Sani wouldn’t have told her to take me here.
“I told you. You’re Ezzen! You have so much more potential than some random office worker. Even if you weren’t the guy who wrote all those papers, or if you weren’t the first case of a second-contact flametouched—I’d still want to get ahead of the game. We could train you up, make a Radiance out of you.”
What?
Seriously, what?
I had always wanted to wield magic; formal training of any kind would be a dream come true. But the fantasy had always been to do so with the Spire, as a Vaetna. Joining another group, even one with a good reputation like Lighthouse, had hardly even entered my mind. I wanted smooth carapace and the dance of blades, not ribbons and heart-shaped explosions. That was Star’s fantasy. And besides, Radiances—that was, the members of Lighthouse—were magical girls. Was this all a hilarious misunderstanding? I certainly didn’t look particularly masculine. I half-lowered the spear.
“You. Um. You did do your reading on me, right?”
“Dalton Colliot, 20 years old. Born to Samantha and Carpenter Colliot in Bristol, UK. Lived in Philadelphia between the ages of 8 and 13, then went back to Bristol after father died by inferno. Goes by ‘Ezzen’ online, Vaetna superfan and magical expert. What did I miss?”
“Male.”
She let out a sigh, breezy, as though this fact of my identity was an inconvenience of circumstance. Like a traffic jam, or finding that you were out of milk. “So?”
“I figured that’d matter.”
“Not as much as you’d think. You wouldn’t be the first.”
It wasn’t much of an offer—they essentially had me hostage. Did the Vaetna know? They must—maybe that was what she had meant about the war, or maybe that was purely a function of my existing level of magical knowledge. I had to get out of here. But at the same time…the Vaetna weren’t taking new members; it was unclear if that was a ‘couldn’t’ or ‘wouldn’t’. Lighthouse apparently was, the gender thing notwithstanding. This was an opportunity to live a version of my dream, if a slightly altered one.
She trotted toward the door, stopping to turn those too-blue eyes on me again. “Also, seriously, if absolutely nothing else, please tell me you’ll get Ai to look at that. Blood’s a great look on you, but that just comes off as amateurish. You were in a hurry, I guess. Later!”
And she was gone, leaving me alone with my thoughts and the spreading patch of crimson on the sheets. I put away the spear, chewing on the conversation, grateful at the painkillers still in my system.
All in all, I was safe…ish. Safer than being out on the road, at least. But Hina had been terrifying for those few moments. What was she? Was that what using the Flame turned you into, if it was really as cruel and basal of a process as it had felt? That was followed by a moment of terrible suspicion—what if the Vaetna were like that too, hidden beneath it all?
That thought was too unpleasant to stomach, so I resisted the urge to derail into it, returning to contemplating the cause-and-effect. It could be the other way around—a filtering effect where only the ones with the capacity to be…like that…achieved real power and notoriety. Both? I didn’t want to be that. Did I have a choice? The voice—voices? more than one?—had implied I was doing it wrong. Trust? There was some hope in that, maybe, but that raised the further question of who or what the hell that had been. The Frozen Flame didn’t talk.
Also—“you wouldn’t be the first.” What did that mean?
I would find out soon enough.
Author’s Note:
Thanks to the beta readers: Softies, Zak, Maria, Cassiopeia. You guys rock.
Join the Discord to discuss the story and hang out with other Sunspot readers!
Join the Patreon to support the story and read chapters three weeks ahead of public!
