After Hours- Holly and Yoko

There’s a city where the buildings all look the same, the sun never shines, and rain falls all the time.  In this rainy city is a rundown mall, and, in this mall, past the food court was a music store.  Lining the walls were countless guitars, a few signed by famous and not-so-famous musicians.  Where there weren’t instruments, there were layers upon layers of posters.  They slowly peeled from the walls revealing more underneath.  The rows of CDs and vinyls occupying the center of the room were scarcely wide enough for a single person to walk down.

It’s closed now.

The area where it stood has been made to look like just another wall.  Nobody can say why, but, after the fire, it feels empty. Stores have tried to open there, but they all fail within their first year.  Nobody would have guessed the nature of the fire that took place.

===
It’s dark out, well after most people have gone home.  The mall is locked.  It continues to rain as it normally does:  just enough of a drizzle to be miserable.  The clouds are thick enough that the moon can’t be seen.  The few breaths of light are pitiful, lonesome islands of the streetlamps and stoplights in a sea of shadow.  Grass grows wild through cracks in the pavement.  The parking lot is bare.

Yoko is walking home from one of her “gigs.”  She’s proud of herself in the way only an idiot can be, humming and laughing at her accomplishments in her head.  The night couldn’t be more inviting; even the rain felt good.  She’s wearing a heavy jacket lined with faux-fur she acquired before running away.  Leading her, a small raccoon dog, Poko, follows his nose to the prize:  the music store.  Yoko went through a lot of guitars that night, and she’s looking to restock.

Such is the life of a vagrant magical girl.

Poko comes to a stop outside a certain door at the back of the mall.   Yoko squats down and pets him before letting him off his leash.  While her companion raids a dumpster, the back of the store invites her with promises of an easy haul.

===

Holly hates rainy days. The magical girl’s more subdued than usual as she picks her way down the rain-slick street, hunched against the rain with her hands in her pockets. She sees a crumpled soda can on the sidewalk and kicks it without breaking stride. It flies off into the dark like a small, metallic comet, clattering as it lands.

She’s wearing a stained hoodie several sizes too large for her with the sleeves rolled up, and has a khaki backpack slung over her shoulders. From under the hood, sharp blue eyes glare at the world, rimmed by short brown hair and a faint scowl.

It’s been almost a week since she’d been shanghai’d into becoming a magical girl, and her new life’s starting to get to her. Sure, having superpowers was great, but that still left everything else. At least she isn’t going to starve as long as she has the backpack.

This isn’t so bad, she tells herself. She has superpowers. She’s doing something that matters, even if it’s all she has now. Even if she’s on her own in a strange city, and Puuchu’s no longer around to give advice and generally be a creepy Kyubey knockoff. She still has that cash, safely wrapped up in her backpack’s depths. She’ll figure something out, somehow. Right now, she has hunting to do.

Distracted, she stumbles mid-step.

“Damnit.” she grumbles, recovering her stride and glancing around the darkened street. No one’s in sight. She keeps walking, searching for the surge in dark magic she thought she’d sensed earlier. Beating up a monster will have to do for stress relief, if she can find one.

===

Yoko walks into a small office hidden in the back.  Small, cramped, filled with the smell of cigarettes, it was a place she might find cozy.  Walking up to the desk, she plops herself down in the ratty leather chair behind it.  The desk is made of scuffed wood, but it’s hard to tell under the cigarette butts, beer cans, and the desk planner with no paper left.  She rummages through drawers.  Finding nothing there, she runs her hand beneath the desk.  Gum.  Gum.  Paper.  Yoko peels it away from the bottom.

There’s a combination written on it.  Giddy, she spins around in her chair.  Meeting her is a huge portrait of Johnny Cash smiling down on her.  She runs her hand along the edge of the portrait, crosses her fingers, then pulls.  It swings open, revealing a small safe nestled in the concrete before her.

“Jackpot.”

She returns to the safe to enter the combination.  She misses a number, curses.  Yoko spins again.  There’s a click as the safe unlocks.  Laughing, her eyes shining with greed, Yoko opens the safe.  The inside is coated with a thick slime.  Yuko gags and slams it shut.  Slime continues to leak out from inside the safe.

“Sick.”

She swings Johnny Cash back into place.

“Thanks, Johnny, you were a lot of help.”

Yoko buries her nose into her sleeve as she turns to leave.  Stepping out into the store floor, she finds her prize.

“Ah, Poko, you beautiful little devil.”

===
As Holly trudges through the rain, she suddenly notices something. She looks up sharply, squinting at the gloom. There! A faintly malevolent, rapidly fading magical charge in the air. Definitely left by a monster.

“Ha! Gotcha!” She smirks, gloom vanishing at her discovery- she’s finally found the trail. Time to follow it, track down the thing that left it, and zap it back to wherever it came from!

Giddy at the prospect of cutting loose with her powers, Holly summons her lightning rod, glancing down at the tarnished metal needle as she considers transforming here and now. She decides against it after a moment’s thought. She doesn’t know if the monsters can sense her magic like she can sense theirs, but she doesn’t want to risk scaring this one off. She’d just have to find it again...and that wouldn’t be much fun. Not to mention the people it might hurt if it does get away. She can wait until she’s a bit closer to break out the lightning.

Holly starts to follow the trail, the spring back in her step.

===

Yoko walks the shop, casually inspecting each and every guitar in the store.  She takes them down one at a time, brushes her fingers across the strings, feels the weight, then tosses it into her hammerverse.  Taking down a bass, she finds one of those gaudy, illegible signatures on the pickguard.  Above where the bass had been set was a picture of a man playing on stage with a small placard beneath it.

He seems pretty cool.

She slings the bass over her back, then continues her looting.

Gotta remember to look this guy up.  Maybe they have some of his CDs.

In the back room, there’s now a stain over Mr. Cash.  With a wet tear, slime spills out onto the desk.

Out front, a carousel displaying patches spins slowly in front of Yoko’s face.  At times, she places her hand gently on its top to halt its movement, and, if there’s an attractive patch, plucks it from the display.  Exhausting all that interested her, she steps out from behind the counter to peruse, then liberate, the aisles of good music.

While the bandit out front continues to pillage, the mass of slime in the back grows from a puddle to a putrid mass.  It quivers.  Stops.  Quivers again, then begins to expand outwards.

Out of its core, an appendage thrusts out, anchors itself to the ground, then drags the rest of its body forward.  The movements become more fluid as its mass starts to reach its full expansion, forming into a wobbling cube.  Guided by its hunger, it spills out into the store and sends a stool crashing to the floor.

Yoko’s squatting between a row of CDs.  She traces her finger along the cases looking for a single name.

“Poko, don’t be so loud.  We don’t want to attract any attention.”

She returns to her search.  In the dimly lit store, progress is slow.

“Ah! I can’t read a damn thing.”

Falling back on her butt, she looks up to the ceiling, and traces her eyes along the dark shape of the various ducts and pipes above her.  She rubs her aching shins and sighs.  Rising back to a squat, she sidesteps slowly along the length of the aisle, tracing her finger across the names.  There, at the end, she finds the name she was looking for.  Yoko claps her hands together.

There’s a loud crash of shattering glass as the beast knocks a case off the countertop.

“Damn it, Poko.”

Yoko reaches for the CD.  Another heavy crash stops her.  Yoko jumps and falls back on her butt.

This fucking guy.

She stands up.

“You stupid rat, what’s the matter with you?”

She furrows her brows in the darkness.  The counter’s empty.

“Don’t run away from me.”

===

A block down the street, Holly’s sure that her hunt’s coming to an end. It’s all she can do not to break into a run. She absently twirls her lightning rod in her fingers as she jogs along. Her heart’s racing with a mix of anticipation and nerves. This is it. This is what she lives for.

Something glimmers in the corner of her eye, and she stops walking, pulling back her hoodie to get a better look. The side of the lamppost is coated in some kind of dark, thick sludge or goo. That isn’t what gets her attention, though. It’s the magical charge bleeding off it, so strongly that she’s surprised she didn’t notice it earlier...and the fact that it’s screaming “hunger”.

That’s not good. That’s not good at all. If it’s that hungry, and it runs into someone...Holly swallows, expression determined, and starts running.

===

Yoko crosses over to the counter where she finds the shattered remains of the carousel and the register on the floor.  There’s a trail of slime leading off into the darkness.  And, strangely, on the ground is a skull coated in the slime.  She picks it up.

“I don’t remember seeing this.  Is it real?  Looks fake.”

She moves the jaws up and down,

“Hello, my name is Mr. Skull.  Haha.”

A tongue falls out.

It hits the ground with a wet thud.  A shiver jolts down her back.  She drops the skull and her muscles retract tightly.

“Eww eww eww.  That’s real.”

Peppering the ground around the skull are more chunks of flesh knocked loose by its fall.

“Yep, that’s real.  I touched it.  Oh God.  This isn’t cool.”

She starts to wipe her hands on a t-shirt.  Raising her fingers slightly, she sniffs her fingers, and dry heaves again.

“Oh man, I can still feel it too.  This is so gross.  Oh man.  It’s so sick.”

As she gets over the shock of her initial disgust, another thought enters her head.  Something killed the owner of that skull, and left it here covered in slime.  Something left it there in a puddle of slime which trailed off into the dark.  Something still there with her.

“Poko!”

She drops to the floor.  Her breath comes in quick, shallow bursts.  A strange, dreadful curiosity tugs at her to follow the trail.  She knows she should cut her losses now -but!- she crawls, stops, then crawls again towards its source.  The trail turns into the aisle she was in before hearing the crash.  There, at the aisle’s entrance, she finds another hunk of flesh.  The rancid smell burns her senses.  She heaves in her mouth before continuing.

Oh man.  Not cool.  What am I doing?

She sniffs back some tears.  Yoko freezes.  The section of CDs she had been browsing was missing.  Her head drops in defeat.

“That bastard.  That cruel bastard.  A murderer and a thief.”

Yoko shifts her position.  Squatting now, she starts to creep forward.  By now, the remains are becoming more common and the slime thicker.  She looks up.  Caught in shadow from the light outside the store was a shambling mound.

What is that?

It doesn’t appear to have any sort of eyes.  This fact worries Yoko.  How is she supposed to know if it noticed her?  She falls back into the shadows.  More than having no eyes, it has no head, or really anything to identify it as having an intelligence she could understand.  It shivers.  Another bone slides out from its body.

No, no. No way.  I’m done.

She begins to turn.  The cube slides towards her.  She freezes.  It slides forward again.  Yoko stops breathing.  It then turns so that one of its faces is towards her. She runs.

Knocking a row of CDs over behind her, she breaks for the back room.  It smashes through the row, cutting her off.  Yoko stands in the shadows of the store.  Before her, a maneater blocks her path to freedom.  She thinks to herself how cool she would look, if she wasn’t crying a little.  Steadying her hand, she grips the neck of the bass on her back.

===

Holly skids into the mall’s barred front doors, leaving a handprint smeared on the glass as she peels herself off again. She tries the door, and isn’t surprised when it refuses to budge. She’s getting far, far too used to running into locked doors when hunting. A trail of dried black slime leads under the doorway.

A frown. She steps back, and takes a deep breath, coming to a snap decision. She needs to get inside as fast as she can, and she needs her powers to do that.

Holly drops her bag and runs back out from the canopy to under the open sky. The rain’s slowed down but it’s still falling.

“Day or night…” Holly starts to recite. Standing on one foot, she spins in a half circle with her lightning rod held as far over her head as she can. The rain slows to a trickle around her, and her hair stands on end as the air hums with power. She doesn’t remember if she’d been trying to rip off Sailor Moon or Green Lantern when she’d come up with these lines, only that she’d been in a hurry at the time. And panicking.

“Fighting for what’s right…”

There’s a rumble of distant thunder. The clouds swirl overhead.

“Lightning of justice!”

The clouds part to reveal blue skies, and a jagged fork of lightning spears down into the rod with pinpoint accuracy. Arcs of crackling blue and white electricity wash over Holly from head to toe, warm and soothing rather than burning. Her jeans and hoodie are replaced by a skirt and midriff-baring aviator’s jacket. A cap materializes from thin air in a shower of sparks. Holly stamps her foot down, and boots form over her sneakers in a flash of light. A clap of her hands and gloves appear with a rumble of distant thunder. A pair of tinted goggles complete the ensemble. Holly completes her spin, static electricity still tingling around her, and grins.

NOW she’s ready to hunt.

She lowers her arm until she’s pointing the lightning rod at the mall entrance. First order of business? Getting rid of that door.

Pausing long enough to scoop up her backpack, Holly calls out as she channels her magic.

“Saint Elmo’s Light!”

The doors explode in a flash of light and noise as the ball lightning hits, scattering pieces of metal and glass everywhere. Her ears ringing, Holly’s already running inside.

===

It’s really quiet.

The stillness disturbs Yoko.  She’s been staring the beast down for only a few seconds, but it feels so much longer.

There’s a bang from out in the atrium.

The beast lurches forward.  Yoko jumps away.

 Too late; strings of slime splash across the sole of one of her shoes.  She ignores it, and pushes herself to her feet with both hands.  It occurs to her that something is missing, then her eyes fall on the bass next to the slime.  A strange smell of burnt rubber forces its way into her nose and away from the loss of her weapon.  Looking down, she lifts her foot.  Strings of rubber stretch out from her sole.  Yoko falls on her back and kicks the shoe off with the other.  It sails through the air, and lands on the surface of the slime.   Its noiseless absorption reminds Yuko of a sinking ship.

You can have it.

She removes her other shoe and throws that at it too.

“I hope you choke.”

Standing back up, she begins to slowly pace around the blob. While it devours her shoe, then her bass, she makes her way slowly to a wall where she removes another guitar.

Good a time as ever.

Yoko slips her hand into backpocket.  It slides into her pocket dimension from where she pulls out a pick for her guitar.  She readies her guitar, breathes in, and imagines herself in front of a large crowd.

Too bad I’m only playing for you.

“One, two, one, two, three, go.”

The magic starts to pulse.  A deep, bass wave of energy runs through her body in measured tempo.  Her arms go cold, then a liquid warmth flows down towards her fingers.  The vibrations in her heart soften as the energy transfers to her fingers.  The pick starts to glow.  A more sophisticated talent might make more effective use of that magic, but Yoko isn’t about that.  She slams down the first note as her transformation begins to kick off.  It makes a loud, jarring noise.

Her shoe must have been more appetizing than she thought.  The blob smashes through the row of CDs separating them.

“No good.”

Yoko throws her guitar and pick, abandoning the transformation.  The pick explodes with a loud pop.  The guitar becomes lodged in the cube.  Like the rest of her belongings, it sinks into the blob.  Her head pounds and her ears ring.  The sudden severing of her magic leaves her ill.

I’m not going to be able to do this if I can’t get some distance.

Yuko looks left, right, then behind her; she’s trapped.  With nowhere to run, she pulls another guitar off the wall.    Her hands shake and her head spins, but, in her moment of need, her thoughts turn to that loyalest of companions, Poko.

I’ll kill that raccoon.

She imagines throwing Poko in that cube.

===

Holly rushes into the dark, deserted mall, holding her lightning rod out in front of her like a sword. The shops around her are all barred and the booths are empty, and there’s no sign of her prey yet. Wherever that monster’s hiding, its close enough for her to feel its presence constantly now, and an equally strong urge to take it down. Holly lets that instinct take over as she rushes in.

There. A music shop, just past the escalator. There’s a noise coming from inside. Holly’s eyes widen as she gets closer, and sees a flash of light...and a person moving in the back. There’s someone trapped inside with that thing! She’s got to do something!

“Hey!” She yells, sprinting over as fast as she can, electricity crackling around her. “Over here!”

Yoko feels her muscles relax.

“Poko, you little angel, you came back!”

Wait. That’s not Poko.

Yoko wishes for a moment the monster would eat her.

How long was she there?  Come on, Yoko, you’re a professional.

With the newcomer attracting the slime’s attention, Yoko dives past it, and rolls.  She now stands near the counter.  A large part of her wants to run -now- but there’s a charge in the air.

Magic.

That’s a magical girl.  Damn, I can’t let her see me run away like this.

Holly bursts into the shop without slowing down, sending the door flying open.  "Hey!” She blurts out, looking at the tall girl with dyed hair who’s just jumped past the blob. She probably works here or something, and seems surprisingly calm for someone who just nearly got eaten. “Sorry, don’t know who Poko is, but you need to run! Right now! I'll take care of-" She gestures for emphasis at the doorway, keeping her lightning rod trained on the giant blob of…

Holly stares.

“Wait, is that jello? What the heck?” she blurts disbelievingly, forgetting all about the hunt and the other girl for a second as she gets a good look at her prey. She’s seen some strange things lately, but a giant killer amoeba is still pretty far up there. Holly shakes her head, eying the blob of...something as she keeps talking. “Never mind! Get out of here, or that thing’ll eat you!”

The cube’s wobbling ominously over her, but doesn’t seem to want to make the first move.

===

At least someone is as confused as I am about this.

Reaching into her back pocket, Yoko pulls out another pick.  She palms it, waiting to see what would happen.  Another bad transformation might be all she could handle.

“Hey, don’t worry about me.  I’m a professional.  Just throwing a rowdy customer out.  You think I’m afraid or something?”

Yoko takes a small step back toward the exit.

Oh man.

Holly looks away from the monster at that, jaw dropping as she stares at the shop employee. “You…Did you miss the part where it’s going to EAT YOU?! Run!” Holly snaps, quickly going back to staring down the cube.

Lightning crackles around her as she shifts from foot to foot, ready to dodge if the cube gets any bright ideas. She can’t afford to argue with a madwoman with a deathwish.  She scowls. “Urgh, fine! Get back at least!” She barks, then brings her rod around in a cutting motion. “Lightning sphere!”

A crackling orb of bright white electricity flares into existence where the rod’s passed, searing the air as it crosses the short distance between Holly and the blob...then vanishes on impact with a pop and a loud, damp fizzle. The blob wobbles violently, but seems completely unharmed.

Holly...stares.

“Um. Well. That...that’s not good.” She mumbles, sounding sheepish more than terrified and eying the blob as it starts to slide in her direction. She swallows. “Um...crazy girl? Now’d be a REALLY good time to run...”

===

Now’s as safe as ever to make another attempt.

“Run? but the show’s just begun.”

Yoko readies guitar three.

Poko’s going to be working overtime.

“One, two, one, two, three, four, go!”

She raises the pick as magic starts to pulse once again.  The room begins to fade away in her mind.  A spotlight falls on her.  Then, the crashing first note comes down like a wave.  Emergency lights in the store dim as a light illuminates her.  She begins to play.

Her coat chips away like ash in the wind as her normal clothing is consumed.  Yoko always hated this part a little.  Stockings, a dress, an apron tied in a bow around her back, and that stupid headband all materializes on her body as she goes through her transformation.  The last bit is always the black shoes.  Thoughtlessly tapping them against the floor, her movements are all very automatic at this point.

Now for the finale.

Incandescent in her hands, magic surges through her guitar more and more.  Strings snap and reform.  With the final note, the magic inside the guitar is released, violently.  It shatters with a thunderous explosion in the cramped store.  Yoko’s ears ring, but she’s used to that by now.  Transformed fully, she reaches back into her pocket universe and withdraws another guitar.

“Thank you.  Now for the main attraction.”

Yoko lunges towards the slime.  Drawing her guitar back like a bat, she feeds it some magic, then slams it against the side of the slime.  It shatters.  A violent ripple radiates out across the cube pausing its advance, but it’s otherwise unharmed.

Her attack a failure, Yoko jumps back and draws out guitar number five, a bass.

“The ol’ ultraviolence won’t work so well on this one.”

She puts magic into the pick and the bass’s strings.  Striking a note sends out a wave of harsh noise, and sends another ripple across the slime.  Glass at the storefront shatter out into the mall’s atrium.

At least the guitar didn’t break this time.

===

“Huh? Show? What-” Holly demands...and then she sees, hears, and FEELS the magic washing over the girl. She gapes, almost dropping her rod in surprise. She’s another magical girl. There’s ANOTHER magical girl in this city, and she’s ALIVE, and she’s right there. Questions race through her mind, rapidfire- who IS she? Did Puuchu...recruit her too? Why didn’t he tell her? What’s she doing here? And WHY is her outfit a maid costume of all things?

“Oh god, you...you’re a…” She stammers, her ears ringing. “That…that guitar, you...it...maid?!” She knows she’s babbling, her questions drowned mostly drowned by the noise, but she can’t help herself. The other girl doesn’t seem to notice, instead pulling out another guitar and going after the monster. She says something too, but Holly can’t quite make it out with her ears ringing.

“What? I can’t hear you!” Holly replies, then shakes her head violently, pulling herself back together. The new girl hits the slime again with another guitar, making it wobble some more. She doesn’t seem to be scared at all. Holly wishes she had that kind of calm.

Whoever this mysterious stranger is, they have the right idea. Holly raises her rod, her resolve coming back. She should be helping her fight the monster. It’s what she came here to do after all. Besides, she doesn’t want to look bad in front of the first other magical girl she’s actually met.

Holly glares at the creature, then darts up alongside the guitarist and jabs her lightning rod towards it. Bolts of electricity surge from the wand and into the monster, less intense than her earlier ball lightning but forming a continuous arc that stuns the creature in its tracks. Sparks are flying everywhere, and some of the wall posters are smoldering. The air’s filled with the smell of smoke and burnt blob, and the flickering voltage casts flickering light over the store.

Holly flicks her wrist, and the beam stops. The ringing in her eardrums’ starts to fade. She swallows.

“Um...Yeah. Any ideas how to kill this thing?” She asks the other girl nervously, not taking her eyes off the blob.“I’m not sure how long I can keep this up...and pretty sure I’m not hurting it much, which is complete bullshit, by the way...” She babbles as she sends another couple of quick bolts into the blob to no effect. She’s getting worried as she’s starting to feel the drain from using her magic, and the blob doesn’t seem to be hurt by it.

There’s a burning sensation across the surface of the blob.  It pauses.  Somewhere, its rudimentary nervous system begins to churn.  While it appears to have no eyes, littered across its surface are light sensitive cells.  It could see well enough to see the shape of food.  It lurches out towards the closest one.  The food jumps out of the way.  It knocks something over on top of the blob.  Food?  It absorbs it.

Another failure, Yoko retreats again.  Her guitar clips a row of drumsticks, sending them flying across the surface of the creature.  Like her shoes, they sink into it.  Yoko cries out to the girl,

“Oh, it’s really harmless.  I think it may have given up.”

An object flies past her head, and lodges itself in the drywall behind her.  She feels a dull thump near her thigh.  Looking down at her ruined bass, she sees a drumstick shot through its body.  Ruined, she abandons it on the ground.

“Nevermind.”

Yoko coughs.

Smoke?

The slime’s quivering; in the light she sees more of its impromptu missiles rise near the surface.  Yoko coughs again.  Her eyes begin to burn.  Smoke snakes in front of the slime and tears cloud her eyes.  Nearly blind, she dives out of the way.  Several more impacts crack against the wall where she had been standing.

The smoke’s getting thicker.  Thick enough that,

“Yep,”

Cold water splashes down from above.  Her outfit clings to her while beads of water run down her legs.  She shivers and spits water out of her face.  Little pitter patter marks dance across the slime’s surface.  She can’t help but laugh to herself.

This fucking night.

She calls,

“Hey, Magical Girl, you throw lightning around, yeah?”

Holly yelps as she’s soaked too when the sprinklers go off and frigid water washes over her. Her goggles means she can still see just fine, but the water feels like icy daggers against her skin. Goddamnit. All that water’s going to make things a lot harder for her. It takes a second for Yoko’s question to register.

Holly blinks, shooting a quick glance over. She pushes wet hair out of her goggles with her free hand.“Yeah, that’s kind of my thing!” She replies, baffled. “Why?”

“Listen, ah, it’s really wet, and electricity doesn’t really play well with water, but it does play well with guitars.  I can’t explain the science, but, you know, just trust me.  Electricity goes into the guitar, music comes out.”

“Wait...you want me to shock YOU? That’s… that’s crazy!” Holly shakes her head, scattering water droplets everywhere. “What if you’re wrong? That blob’s lightning-proof but… um… I’m pretty sure you’re not.”

“It’ll be fine.  Look, when I was a kid.  I used to stick forks into the outlets, and I’m fine.  Plus, I’ve dealt with my share of backyard pyrotechs and electricians.”

Burying her mouth into her sleeve, Yoko stands up and runs over to the other girl.  Several more sticks mark her path in the wall behind her.

At least it’s not smart enough to lead.

Now, standing near the girl, she reaches into space and grabs another guitar.

“See! just like an amp.” She holds in a cough.

Focus, girl.

Holly gulps, eying the blob through the dissipating smoke and the downpour from the sprinklers. It’s not like she has any better ideas, the water’s going to make things even harder, and this girl seems to know what she’s doing. If the worst comes to the worst...well, the two of them can still get out of here, right? She looks up at the other magical girl and nods. “Okay, what the heck...Let’s do this!”

“That’s the spirit.  You gotta let it flow.”

Yoko opens the flow of magic inside her.  It pulses outward.  That familiar bass in her heart fills her with energy.  The vibrations travel down her arm into her finger and into the guitar.  Her fingers burn with energy, but it fades away from her conscious.  Her mind pushes her body away.  The stage, the lights, and the crowd is all she needs at that moment.

Holly sees the other girl start to channel her magic, and hesitates. She’s never tried something like this before. All she knows how to do is what Puuchu told her about calling on her magic and the attacks she’s figured out herself (and occasionally named) these last few days. She doesn’t know what the guitarist wants her to do, but she knows she’s counting on her, and that they NEED to kill that monster.

Holly makes a snap decision and raises her arm overhead, gripping her lightning rod tightly in a balled fist. Then she jabs it down onto the guitar’s case, impaling the soundboard with the point. The few windows left intact until now shatter as thunder roars and arcs of electricity crackle around the duo.

“Did it work? You okay?” Holly shouts over the din, standing face to face with the taller girl as she hastily tugs her focus free from the now crackling guitar. She really hopes this one isn’t about to explode too.

Electricity pumps through Yoko.  Her muscles spasm.  She grinds her teeth.  The lights flicker, and amps whine out sharp feedback.  The magic from this new girl mixes with Yoko’s, and it’s far, far more powerful than her own.  She breaks out in a sweat.

Hold it, Yoko.

Opening one eye is exhausting, and two is almost too much.  But, she has to see her target to hit it.  The physical world is gone.  She sees only magic.  There’s a current flowing from her to the guitar, and a larger one from the other girl to it as well.  The guitar glows like the sun.  She sees the cube of magic that was the slime.

Yoko runs forward out of her own body in a glowing ghost of magic.  It rushes forward and splits into two.  They jump, raise their guitars, and crash down on the slime.  When it clears, there’s a ghost of the victorious Yoko.  And, kneeling beside her, is another Yoko.  The one who failed.  Her neck is pierced by a final missile.  She coughs up blood, and falls to one side.  The slime crawls over her.

The visions of two possible futures flashes out.  A cruel gift from the surge of magic. Yoko sees the lines of magic laid out before her.  A heavy hand grips her body, forcing her forward.  There’s no stopping it now.

She could die.

Please, please don’t let me die tonight.

Fate pulls her into a sprint.

She jumps left.

The slime fires its last missile.

It goes right.

She crashes down on the slime with their combined magic.

The cube resists her blow, but not so much to repel her entirely. The strengths of their magic and the cube’s resistance to it are now locked in their own battle.   Yoko needs more or she risks failing entirely.  The pulse in her heart is becoming unbearable; any more might cause it to explode.  She turns her head back to the other magical girl.  Yoko grits her teeth,

“One more jolt should do it!”

Holly’s been staring, wide-eyed, as the blonde-black haired girl BLURS past her and slams into the cube with impossible speed. She’s...amazing. This stranger’s beating the monster into pulp without any fear or hesitation...and why is SHE standing there when she should be helping?

“Right there with you!” She shouts, then runs in after Yoko with a high-pitched yell, aura of electricity flaring up around her and water boiling into puffs of steam in her wake. Yoko’s between her and the blob, still swinging the guitar around like it’s a club.

Without thinking, Holly skids to a stop and grabs onto the guitar’s neck as well, just under Yoko’s grip. Lightning bolts fly wildly around the duo as Holly channels all of her remaining magic into the instrument in a barely controlled pulse. Together, the pair of magical girls awkwardly swing the guitar back around like a club, slamming the overcharged instrument into the blob’s central mass.

Underneath the combined pressures of both their magic, Yoko feels the resistance of the cube give way.  The guitar slams downward, releasing all of its magic in the core of the beast.  It explodes.  As it does, Yoko’s senses are violently cut off from the magic which gripped her.  The force throws both girl back and blankets them in slime that smells of rotten meat.  Yoko laughs,

“Gross.”

“You think?” Holly gives her a look, wiping a clump of foul slime from her face and pulling off her hopelessly smeared goggles. She drops them and they dissipate in a shower of sparks. She’s trying not to breathe the smell in too deeply, but when she’s wearing pieces of the monster, it’s a lost cause.

“Totally worth it.  Breathe it in.  That’s the smell of victory.”

“Thanks, but no thanks.” Holly smirks, breathing shallowly. “But yeah...Scratch one jello monster.”

She looks over at the remains of the slime.  There’s a black spot on the ground and the floor is cracked.  Next to that is a CD.  Crawling on hands and knees under the smoke, she snatches it up.

“Sweet, my CD.”

She pockets it in her apron, and looks over at the other girl. Holly frowns disapprovingly up at her, crossing her arms, but doesn’t say anything.

“Well, seeing as we saved the store, I think it’s only fair.”

An amp explodes to punctuate her words. Holly jumps. Yoko ignores it, grabs a guitar down from the wall, and pushes it towards Holly.

“Here, this is a good one.  You earned it.  I’m Yoko, by the way, magical girl and rock star.  You’re alright.  What’s your name?”

Holly’s been silently watching her, energy slipping away after the fight as her magic use catches up to her...as well as all of the questions she’d briefly forgotten. She’s shaking slightly as she reaches out to touch the guitar, not looking away from Yoko.

“Um….thanks. I’m Holly.” She replies, giving Yoko a tired wave. “I guess you already know I’m a magical girl too. Sorry for telling you to run away, and for calling you crazy. I...I didn’t think I was going to run into…” She trails off again, countless questions on the tip of her tongue. In the end, she goes with the obvious one. “How’d you know what to do there? That thing with the guitar was...that was pretty awesome, actually.” She blurts, hand still resting on the guitar but making no move to pull it closer.

The shop’s gone quiet and dark. The sprinklers have slowed down to a trickle.  Yoko catches some drops in her hand.

They still sting.

“Hey, it’s nothing.  Hit something hard enough and it’ll go down.”

She flexes her fingers.  There are sirens now.

Took long enough.  At least we finished first.

She stands and extends a hand to Holly.

“Holly, this is how you know you had a good gig.  Everything’s broken and somebody calls the police.”

Holly laughs weakly, taking Yoko’s hand and scrambling up. She leaves the guitar where it is. “Hey, the show must go on, right?” As quips go, it’s weak, but she’s too drained to care.

 “There we go, all smiles now.”

The sirens are getting louder. Holly looks up at her, slightly unsteady on her feet. “I...I guess we should get going. You...don’t actually work here or something, do you?”

“Work?  Here?  No way.  It’s a dump. Come on,”

She walks behind the counter, lifts the curtain to the back, and turns to Holly,

“There’s a way out back here.”

Are the sirens a bit louder? Holly nods and hurries after her. “I’m coming, wait up! Is that how you got in?”

“Yeah, VIP, baby.  Only the best.”

“Right. Roll out the red carpet, there’s a rock star in town.” Holly rolls her eyes, but she’s smiling.

Yoko pulls the door open and steps outside. Holly’s right behind her. Outside, the sirens have gotten louder and the rain is still falling.  She shivers.  This maid outfit isn’t the best for the weather.  She turns to Holly.

Holly hesitates, rubbing her arm with one gloved hand. She’s feeling the chill too now that the adrenaline from the fight’s wearing off. She looks around the street, then calls out to Yoko, slightly nervously.

“Um, hey. Yoko? Thanks for the help back there. I’m not sure I could have taken that thing alone, and I...I actually didn’t know there was anyone else like me around here. Another magical girl, I mean. Puuchu didn’t say anything, and I didn’t really think about it and…I guess I’m saying that I’m really glad I ran into you tonight.” Holly babbles, then smiles sheepishly. She holds out one arm, hand balled into a fist.

“Victory knucks?” She asks hopefully.

Yoko looks at Holly’s fist, smiles,

“Sure thing,”

And bumps her fist.

“We’re going to have to run from here.  We can hide at my place.  If we get split up, this key will let you find me.”

Yoko takes a key numbered 618 out and presses it into Holly’s hand.

“Take it to a door.  Any door.  Think, ‘Yoko 618,’ and unlock the door.  It’ll take you to my place.”

Holly takes it. “Huh? Really? You’re giving me a key to your place, just like that?” There’s a note of cautious optimism in her voice. Her hand’s closed around the key tightly, knuckles faintly pale as she looks back to Yoko hopefully. If she means what she thinks she does...

“Of course!  We’re accomplices now, afterall.”

“Accomplices?” Holly’s grinning like an idiot at Yoko’s reply, but doesn’t care. “Partners in crime, huh? That...that sounds pretty good, actually. I...Thanks. Really.”

“Magical Girls need to look out for each other.” They really do.

“Maybe they do, but thanks anyway.” Holly’s smile doesn’t feel like it’s going away anytime soon. Right now, she feels better than she has all week. She’s not alone anymore. She forces herself to sober up a bit.

“Well, partner, how about we get out of here? Don’t want to still be standing around when the cops get here, right?” Holly tries for a Western twang on “partner” but mostly just butchers the pronunciation. She’s too giddy to care. She’d never been good at accents, anyway.

Yoko laughs, catches herself, “Sure thing, John Wayne.  Don’t get too excited, though.  Remember, if we get split up, think of me and 618 before you unlock a door.  You don’t know where you’ll end up unlocking any door willy-nilly.”

“Yeah, wouldn’t want that.” Holly comments, half-turning as the sirens get louder and louder. There are distant voices. “Okay...You and 618. Yoko, 618. Got it.” She glances back to Yoko. “Time to run?”

“Yeah, stay close.  There’s a motel a few blocks from here we can use.”

Holly nods, a glint entering her eyes. “Race you there.” She suggests.

Yoko flashes a wild grin.

“That’s the spirit.”

Stepping out of cover, the pair of magical girls take off running.  Behind them, the first police cars pull into the parking lot.