Mahou Shoujo Troper Magica ~ Imaizumi City ~

"Yeah, I write a lot. Last night I got on a roll with one of my stories. I had been stuck for a while, so when I finally got going I didn't want to stop until I finished it. I didn't even realize that there was a test today until I got to class."

Natsumi sighed.

"Sometimes I wish that I could write my own life, you know? Not have random tests popping up everywhere. That's the fun part of writing stories. You get to decide what happens. Although I guess all the stuff I write is pretty boring compared to this..." She nodded her head at their deranged surroundings. "But at least if I were writing it, I'd make sure we got out okay..." Her voice trailed off.

Natsumi hated it when her fate wasn't in her own hands. She didn't know anything about those two girls who had gone off to fight the witch, and now it was up to them whether or not she was going to make it out of here. Hopefully they wouldn't let her down.

This'll be my last post for the night. Sleep time.

'Night, JTeeth. I don't really have anything to post, so.

Yukino's slow reaction cost her her footing, leading to her sailing into the abyss. She bounced off the side of a balloon, and onto the deck of the pirate ship. Painfully aware of the situation, she quickly got back on her feet and turned her attention to the Witch at the helm of the ship.

The ship lurched dangerously to one side after being struck by Chien's whip. The wood gave up and a long lash appeared on the side of the vessel, from the which a great amount of little crab like creatures poured like blood from a wound. After stabilizing itself the ship proceeded the chase after Chien, trying to align it's cannons with the magical girl to shoot on her.

Meanwhile on the deck, the large blue hat behind the helm moved as if to stare at Yukino. Once it did, every door on the deck of the ship opened, and from it the crab like creatures emerged like a tide to attack the girl that boarded their ship.

Yukino smirked. Right where I want you. Yukino grasped a large tanto in right hand and summoned three smaller knives to her left, she spun, tossing the knives into the crowd, where they divided into many smaller knives, and leapt gracefully into the air. As she gripped the tanto, it began to glow white, slashing down at the deck twice, she covered its surface in ice. Twirling in the air, landed behind on the bridge, facing the helm. Feeling in a bit of a silly mood, she quipped aloud. "Avast, ye scurvy witch."

edited 3rd Mar '11 3:00:32 PM by lockonlockon

Chien continued to bounce along the balloons, using her small bulk and agility to her advantage.

She continually bounced from balloon to balloon, trying to stay a step ahead of the Witch's ship.

She turned again and lashed out with her whip, catching it across the helm, before turning and bouncing again.

This time, however, she overestimated herself, and slipped upon landing. She shrieked, and tried to grab hold of the balloon as she fell.

Chien managed to hold onto one of the balloons as she fell... thought that fall cost her the advantage she had over the ship. Before she knew it the ship passed by her side... it's cannons all lined up at her.

Meanwhile on the deck, the entirety of the crab familiars were frozen in place, their little eyes moving in all directions while they stayed trapped in their icy prison. The witch for her part turned around to face the magic girl. She consisted of a small shadowy form, hidden almost completely under the oversized hat. The witch started to twitch a little at the Magical Girl's challenge and suddenly the hat broke as a sharp beak shot itself from inside of it and towards Yukino.

edited 3rd Mar '11 3:31:30 PM by daltar

Yukino quickly leapt out of the way, throwing one of her dividing knives at the witch.

Chien swore, and clambered up the balloon as the ship started firing at her.

She jumped, not even taking the time to bounce, as it fired its' cannons, puncturing the balloon she was standing on. Desperately, she jumped higher again, trying to get out of the way of its' cannons.

When it angled to shoot at her, she gulped and realized she had no choice.

Jumping down, she aimed for the side of the ship... and missed, landing on top of one of the cannons.

Where the rest of the girls sat they could hear the boom of the cannons and see the light from the lightning charged cannonballs as they were shot.

Once Chien landed on one of the cannons it began to be pulled inside the ship, giving her only a couple of seconds to get off it before she fell from the vessel.

The witch suddenly froze when a flurry of knives stuck themselves on her shadowy body... the giant hat was about to fall to into tatters and through it's mess a pair of yellow eyes could now be seen wide open in shock and staring straight at Yukino.

Yukino leapt into the air and raised a hand, summoning a series of large icicles. She launched them at the deck, watching them expand into more spikes as they hit the surface. Landing on a balloon she watched from afar. Is it dead?

Chien jumped up from the cannon, clinging desperately to the side of the deck.

Indeed, the witch was dead. Pierced and crushed by the icicles, her deck split in half and the whole ship started sink and crumble into the abyss below... With Chien still hanging by the side of the ship.

The only thing which saved the Magical Girl was that the barrier collapsed before the remains of the vessel fell into the darkness. Chien fell to the floor of the roof and the rest of the girls appeared around her. On the ground besides Chien there lay the witch's Grief Seed.

"Congratulations Chien, Yukino. You managed to defeat her" Kyubey said, moving it's tail slightly.

Chien sat up, looking at the Grief Seed.

She rolled it to the other girl, the one that had been actively using her powers.

Chien rarely used anything more than her whip. She had Grief Seeds stored safely away. This other Magical Girl would need it more than her.

Natsumi looked up in shock as the universe seemed to fall apart around her. She began to relax again as she saw sunlight beginning to peek through the rapidly growing holes in the darkness. She released a sigh of relief as she turned to Akira.

"Looks like they took care of it."

edited 3rd Mar '11 8:56:39 PM by JapaneseTeeth

"Looks like," Akira said, standing up as the ropes binding her to the railing disappeared in a flash of white light. The few crabs that had only been incapacitated, weakly twitching on their sides, melted away with the strange fog, and soon the girls were back on the gravel rooftop. The sun was still high in the sky; as Akira stretched out her stiff arms, the bells chimed the lunch hour.

Yukino picked up the grief seed as she returned to her normal form. Holding the grief seed close to the soul gem, she watched as the taint floated into the small sphere. "I suppose you'll be wanting this now." She said as she gently tossed the seed to Kyubey.

"Hey", Kiyohiko called out and stood up from sitting against a wall of the entrance to the rooftop, making both Akira and Natsumi jump up in surprise at the sudden entrance of the strange boy. Kiyohiko spared them a passing glance before walking to Yukino.

"Are you alright?"

"As you can see", Yukino shrugged. Kiyohiko gave her a concerned frown, though only she could tell the difference from his usual expression. The boy didn't press the issue and instead sneaked a peek at the black-haired girl who'd almost mowed him down in the stairs earlier. She was now dressed in what was blatantly magical girl garb, and was eyeing him cautiously.

Well. No point in confronting her unless Yukino intends to, I guess, he shrugged and brushed past Yukino towards the pair hiding behind her back.

"Takumi Kiyohiko, third year. Pleased to meet you. Do either of you require any assistance?"

edited 5th Mar '11 8:54:12 AM by LORd

"Right!"

Kyubey moved the grief seed over it's head until he carefully made it fall to it's back where it was eaten by the symbol on his back. After that he made a contented noise.

"Uhhh...." Natsumi's mind spun as she tried to think of a good explanation for what had happened.

"Akira wasn't feeling well, so I took her up here to get some air. I think she's doing better now." She smiled awkwardly, trying to act as nonchalant as possible and failing miserably. She turned to Akira. "We should probably get back to class, shouldn't we?"

^^^ I hate to nitpick, LORd, but please put your ending punctuation inside your quotation marks: "Hey,", rather than "Hey",. It'll just nag at me otherwise.

The bespectacled third-year had almost seemed to be waiting for them on the rooftop, and he moved through Yukino's personal space with a casualness and ease that suggested long familiarity between the two. Akira's mind was instantly aflame with possibilities, and she almost missed his introduction.

"Um, Takumi-sempai, was it?" she asked, bowing to him. "Pleased to meet you as well; I'm Sasaki Akira, first-year. I think I'm okay, but Natsumi-san might be hurt." She touched a hand to her neck; beneath her fingers, the Witchkiss finished fading away, leaving behind only a very faint bruise. Her leg itched, and she scratched at it with her other foot; the toe of her shoe came away red. Akira looked down at the shallow slice across the top of her foot, and swallowed. "...How did I forget about that?"

edited 4th Mar '11 11:11:50 AM by RedSavant

"Oh, Akira, you're hurt!" Natsumi noticed the cut on Akira's foot for the first time. "Come on, let's get you down to the nurse's office!" She began to tug the reluctant girl towards the stairwell. She had no idea who this boy was, but she did know that that she didn't have time to worry about him at the moment. Whatever was up with those "witch" things was obviously a bigger issue.

"Haruna Natsumi, also first year." She paused to bow curtly at Kiyohiko as she passed by. "Good to meet you."

edited 4th Mar '11 11:33:24 AM by JapaneseTeeth

Sorry about that, holmes. Here in Europe they teach us to do it the other way, but I'll try to fight my conditioning if it irks you.

Kiyohiko gave a tiny nod to Natsumi's greeting and watched the diminutive pair scurry off towards the roof's entrance. He turned back to face Yukino, his eyes briefly meeting the other magical girl's on the way. "Well. They seem to be able to manage."

"I guess they're the type who accept things easily. I did do my best to explain everything to them." Yukino scratched her head.

"And you did a good job of it Yukino. I'm sure that will make my further encounters with them a fair deal easier" Kyubey said before turning back to Chien "Chien, Are you alright? Things didn't seem to go too well for you in the last part of the fight"