Difference between revisions of "2017-05-06 - Rest Stop"

Latest revision as of 00:48, 12 August 2017

<Pose Tracker> Sayaka Miki [Ohtori Academy (9)] has posed.

The bathroom stall creaks open, a caped figure blotting out much of the buzzing yellow light from outside, her shadow falling across the squat toilet set into the tile. Sword glimmering, she steps forward, pauses, and then sets her boot against the flusher.

"Round end round ta murburry bush, ta mankey chase ta weesur..." Sayaka sings softly to herself in thickly accented English. "Push it down and give it a flush," she adds in Japanese as she does so, the water roaring softly as it gutters down.

Agitated by the flow, a wormlike, jester-colored creature erupts from the toilet, blindly seeking the intruder.

"Pahp! go ta weesur," Sayaka sings, swinging her sword through its midsection and halving it into glimmering black motes.

A minute later, Sayaka emerges from the bathroom, holding her sword at arm's length from two fingers and grimacing at it. She pushes it into a trash can, leaving it there to dissipate later. "Gross!" she complains. "They were in all the toilets..."

The sky is far above, starry and cloudless despite the thick coating of snow on the mountains all around them. The Chevaliers have found themselves, tonight, at a rest stop on an ill-travelled mountain road leading to the loggery. It's well-appointed, with clean picnic tables, numerous glowing vending machines, and spacious bathrooms, as well as a coin-operated tire pump machine. But like most of Nishitama, it's been rotten with Familiars for months.

"Everyone else done?" Sayaka calls. After all, there were also familiars in:

• The men's room
  
• The vending machines
  
• The roadside gutter
  
• An abandoned cargo truck by the road

Sayaka's touching the gem at her navel, eyes half-closed. "...that's it for around here, I think. Chika-chan, you agree? If we're clear we should take a break."

[OOC] Chika Aki dibs the mens room.
[OOC] Nori Ankou says, "well, /i/ didn't say it"
[OOC] Sayaka Miki says, "I doubt anyone's going to contest that"
[OOC] Chika Aki cackles.
[OOC] Garnet .:O There are no good surprises there.
[OOC] Fate Testarossa says, "As a member of the Nanoha cast."
[OOC] Nori Ankou says, "If you want you can borrow Batiste so it's not weird."
[OOC] Fate Testarossa says, "I must claim the automobile."
[OOC] Nori Ankou says, "I'll do the vendomats then"

COMBAT: Fate Testarossa transforms into Barrier Jacket Assault!
COMBAT: Chika Aki transforms into Puella Magi Chika!
COMBAT: Chika Aki has fully healed herself.
COMBAT: Sayaka Miki transforms into Puella Magi Sayaka!
COMBAT: Madoka Kaname transforms into Madoka Kaname!
[OOC] Madoka Kaname u.u;
[OOC] Sayaka Miki says, "She tries..."

<Pose Tracker> Chika Aki [Juuban Public School (9)] has posed.

It was something that the cyan Puella Magi needed today. After the last night, fighting against fellow Magical girls trying to murder a small child, Chika really didn't want to be doing anything to complicated, or that required much thought. Trying to figure out the who's-who of Sailor Senshi firing energy at each other is one thing, but today its so much simpler.

Having drawn the proverbial short straw of happenstance, Chika was near Sayaka at the bathrooms. Sayaka of course got the ladies, while Chika's gem had led her to the mens. She swallows, and its time to get to work as she hears Sayaka do the same.

"H-hello? Hello?" She tiptoes in tentatively. You never knew what could be lurking inside. Familiars. Or worse, men. Chika is tentative, creeping in until she is sure no one is going to see her inside the male bathroom, and then she is moving quickly. One stall gets booted open by a metal greave, then the next stall gets booted open. Finally, its the handi-cap stall that gets a kick.

"O-oh I'm so-" Chika pauses as she realizes that the figure that was inside was /not/ a person, but only a vaguely human shaped compilation of what looked like... snakes?

"GAAAH!" *WHAM-WHAM-WHAM*

Chika comes skittering out of the mens bathroom, shivering and hopping from foot to foot as she comes face to face with Sayaka. "They were -snakes-!" She exclaims, shivering. "Bleh. I /hate/ snakes." She grumble, but at the least she is done as she looks around to check on the others. Once most seem done, she'd nod her head to Sayaka.

"Y-yeah. If everyone has cleaned up, I think I'd like that."

<Pose Tracker> Madoka Kaname [Ohtori Academy (9)] has posed.

Madoka has come for this spring cleaning -- early spring? late winter? uwehh... -- armed with an apron, a kerchief, and... a picnic basket. Up until now she's been helpfully battling the physical rather than metaphysical refuse, scooping up cans that missed the waste bin, spearing wads of paper and whatnot with a stick she found in the woods, and so forth.

But now, at last, this is her time. She bounces over to the picnic table with a real spring in her step, sweeps off any evergreen needles that have fallen since the last time someone was here, and opens up the basket. In short order she's unstacked plastic cups (thick ones, reusable, and very clean), unscrewed two thermoses (one tea, one cocoa, and Kaname Cocoa is a one-way trip directly to heaven so its aroma should not be overlooked), and revealed the piece de resistance, a covered tray of cookies that are somehow still steaming even after all this time.

Or maybe that's just her breath in the air. Alone among this company, she's feeling the chill of January significantly, and it has tweaked her ears redder than embarrassment could hope to, her nose redder than someone's teasing hand.

Cold or not, her eyes are bright. "Good job, everyone!" she cheers gaily. "Come and have a snack!"

<Pose Tracker> La Sirene de Diamant [Ohtori Academy (9)] has posed.

La Sirene de Diamant had won things, more or less, it would seem. There was a vending room full of a good eight or ten machines with a range of useful things, primarily drinks but also some onigiri that aren't too old, some other important goods, and perhaps shockingly enough, a small dispenser of MP3 players and video games.

La Sirene walked in and the lights had gone off.

Then they'd seemed to come back on, in a strange and surreal oceanic hue that cast peculiar and alien shadows - though maybe Garnet, of all of them, would recognize the distant echoes and reflections of a blue sun - accompanied by a series of squeaks, blaps, hoo-hoo-hoos, and a couple of good hearty cries of "Les Mysteres, come!"

Then the lights go back to normal.

La Sirene comes out holding four canned Boss Coffees, two in each hand. A fifth one is tucked under her chin. She steers towards that spread-out table, eyes coming up, pale but perhaps not scary to Madoka. She tells her, "One of the machines dropped these after I bumped it." Honest.

The canned coffees are added to the table, although even la Sirene, a devotee of coffee as black and rich and stimulating as her alien realm, is totally ignoring that in favor of the cocoa.

MEANWHILE, Batiste d'Otter, who had gone along with Chika so it wasn't... weird, squeaks to her, "You did tremendously!" His paws are slightly damp from when he washed them off after hopping and clambering around the men's room, where his contributions were in the realm of 'spotting' and 'saying positive things.'

<Pose Tracker> Fate Testarossa [Infinity Institute (4)] has posed.

A dark shape floats down over the abandoned truck, a length of obsidian in her hands. Boots touched down on the abandoned cab with a flutter of cape fabric. Taking a few wary steps along the rusted chrome, it sounded like something out of a horror film, the quiet footsteps of a murderer poised over the vehicle, while people huddled inside.

The soft flutter of fabric in the wind didn't help that imagery, as she she floated to the trailer- then walked along to the back, a quiet rhythm. She could hear Sayaka singing in accented English and surprisingly the tune was familiar. It reminded her of Arisa showing off her English skills to hopskotch on the playground.

It manages to get her to crack a much needed smile, even if she was serious as serious could be right now. Nothing if not dutiful. After traversing the length of the entire truck, she floated down down to hover in mid-air, just behind the trailer door.

One hand squeezed Bardiche, holding him at the ready, while the other gripped the handle, pulled it down, and tugged it open.

With a shriek of metal, the inside of the truck came into full view, a thin crescent of light illuminating some rotting crates of the once refrigerated truck- a sickly smell hitting her nostrils, just as Bardiche swept inside.

Striking nothing but air.

The small girl exhaled in relief, chiding herself for being on edge, as she stepped inside, to kneel down beside the crates, brushing a hand against the wood until she could read it- "Mackerel?" Putting a hand up to her mouth as if to ward off the smell. "It's just rotting fish over here." She calls out to the others.

She didn't notice the shadow rising out from beneath the trailer, climbing into it behind her. A stitched fox's head, with broken buttons for eyes and a mouth with stitches bulging to hold in a mouth full of razor teeth. Half of its torso appeared missing, save the one clawed arm it was using to crawl, nothing but fluff guts that bubbled out of its chest as crawled silently across the floor, while the girl kept shifting aside crates.

Closer and closer it came, poised to strike in a parody of movement. The Device pings. The girl whispers something, "Nevermind."

<Plasma Lancer>

And suddenly there's a boom of thunder, a flash of light within the truck. Electrical arcs playing across the outside of the cab.

The girl floated out not long after, and over to the restrooms, landing in front of the others, "All clear on my end." She looks impossibly bright simply from Madoka's declaration that snacks were available, "I'll take a snack, if you don't mind- please."

<Pose Tracker> Garnet [None] has posed.

Garnet, busy with an unavoidable Gem monster, hadn't been in attendance the night before, but showed up eagerly to help eradicate the familiars in this territory.

Though the trip to Hokkaido helped her feel better for a little while, memories of the Shinjuku hospital still linger with her, and she channels those feelings into the fists she rains upon the familiars she finds, unleashing her anger alone in the unknown depths below.

The others had taken places above ground, but Garnet, shapeshifted her way through the roadside rain gutter to the concrete tunnels below. Among the actual snakes taking refuge are those that... should not be...

She wastes little time in crushing them, the hissing of snakes, the shrieking of familiars, the pounding of her fists and the far off sounds of the main channel's waterflow all coming together in a subterranean cacaphony, as she hunts them down one by one.

Satisfied at last for the moment, she passes back through the grate and topside to join with the others, late, but better than never.

<Pose Tracker> Sayaka Miki [Ohtori Academy (9)] has posed.

Sayaka isn't above laughing at Chika as she rushes out of the men's room; she went through the same thing after all. "Well, it sounds like you told them that," she says amiably.

Taking the long way around the picnic table, Sayaka creeps up behind Madoka. She watches her work for a little, then, with an expression like a cat about to knock a glass from the table, takes her two pointer fingers and gives Madoka's sides a quick, simultaneous poke.

"Hmm..." Sayaka says, eyeballing La Sirene. She doesn't approve of theft. Wrapping her arms around Madoka's waist from behind, she brings her cape with her, so it wraps about Madoka, leaving only her head showing, ET-style. Sayaka's own head is directly atop Madoka's, totem-style. It all looks pretty silly. "I hope you didn't break it unnecessarily... welcome back, Fate-tan." Sayaka singsong's the youngest Chevalier's name as she picks up a cup of hot chocolate, and lifts it not to her own mouth, but to Madoka's.

"I'm sorry to interrupt snacks with anything serious," Sayaka sighs. "But now that we have time, I think we should get an update on the whole... Shinjuku situation." She means, of course, the Shepherds. With her mouth moving and Madoka's ostentatiously occupied by the hot cocoa, it looks unavoidably like Sayaka is a ventriloquist's dummy and Madoka, her puppeteer, is pointedly showing off how well she throws her voice.

The top head of the totem rotates a little on its pink base to look at the approaching Gem. "Me and Garnet weren't there last night... maybe the rest of you can say what you think it was about? Oh, and Madoka-chan wasn't there either," Sayaka adds in a dutiful rush.

<Pose Tracker> Chika Aki [Juuban Public School (9)] has posed.

Chika was very appreciative to have Batiste with her in the mens room to make it just slightly less weird. Otter or not, having him with her helped! She is more then willing to be conjured over to Madoka for snacks. She starts that way once the others are winding down. A smile is cast towards La Sirene when she comes over with some liberated coffees.

Chika raises a hand to twiddle her fingers to the others arriving from their familiars, and her smile warms a little as she watches Sayaka playing with Madoka.

At the mention of what happened the night prior, she frowns a little but gets a cocoa of her own with a murmured thanks to Madoka as she does.

"We were just doing a patrol, and checking out a boutique flower event... And then two girls started trying to kill another girl. They were Sailor Senshi, but... another Sailor Senshi stopped them, so we all jumped in and helped her out. Mami seemed to know one of the ones attacking the girl... They were making a big deal about it, saying she was a danger to us all." She glances around, and lets her gaze linger on Fate for a few moments. She'd caught on that Fate had seen Hotaru before, but she was going to let her volunteer that information!

<Pose Tracker> La Sirene de Diamant [Ohtori Academy (9)] has posed.

"The creature was standing right in front of it, dodging to either side - it must have enjoyed the coffee," la Sirene says as she moves to set down, smiling at the totemic power of SayaDoka. She tosses her hair back even as Batiste gets up to roll a coffee over to where he intends to seat.

"Mm," la Sirene then says as matters become rather grave, though her lips keep threatening to quirk up at the sight of Sayaka's style of speech.

"They were terribly cruel to Mami," la Sirene says, folding her hands on the table. "And yes, they were VERY precise that they needed, in their eyes, to kill her, but very scarce as to why. Could you pass me a cup of cocoa?"

<Pose Tracker> Fate Testarossa [Infinity Institute (4)] has posed.

Fate looks a little embarrassed at being called Fate-tan. For the almost baby talk way of addressing her, but she's got a smile there, "Thanks." Bardiche vanishes in a shimmer of light, fading away into some version of standby while she still remains at the ready. She takes a moment to seat herself at the picnic table, and then she falls into silence- as she takes a mug of cocoa, and then doesn't do much at all.

In fact she's just staring into its murky depths as Sayaka asks for a report about what happened. It's like she's mulling over some topic which was far too grave for any kid her age to be thinking about. Turning it over, trying to make a weighty decision.

Her eyes flit just out of the corner of her vision as Chika speaks, then towards La Sirene, before she finally swallows and says fairly quietly, "I think I know why they were targetting that girl- Hotaru Tomoe."

And now her eyes move upon Sayaka, and Garnet, their senior, but only out of the top of her vision, her chin still tipped down, hands playing with the edge of the cocoa mug as she slowly moves it in almost childlike repitition, "She goes to my school and- there's a lot of bad rumors surrounding her. I tried to meet her once, and she was so kind at first... but then it was like she became really sick, and I tried to help her..."

She trails off quietly, "And she changed. She attacked Bardiche and me. Broke him. Whatever it was that happened with her. It's bad. Real bad. There wasn't anything strange about her before but-"

She winces at the coming admission, an admission that makes her feel like she really doesn't belong here after all, "I've been to D-Point, knelt before Queen Beryl. Back when I- when I-" She winces again, stops, starts again, "It's... it's as bad as her, whatever happened with her. That's how bad it is."

Part of her shivers, as she tries to force her hands to still with the warmth of the cup, "I think they're trying to kill her to stop whatever that is."

<Pose Tracker> Garnet [None] has posed.

Garnet makes her way over to the group, dismisses her gauntlets, takes a cocoa in both of her hands and sits with it, letting the aroma soothe her figurative nerves. Garnet, smiles sentimentally at Sayaka and Madoka's bundling together under one cape. but when Sayaka asks the others to describe the events of the preceding night, she tries her best to tear her eyes away and listen, to piece together what's happened from their accounts: Two Sailor Senshi. Shepherds? Attacking a girl, who's changed suddenly. Who has already or might be taken over by a dark presence or power, equal to a dark general who she knows only through reputation, but that reputation is of the foulest sort. Or wait, what was it that La Sirene said? A creature? Mami? Was Mami the one being hunted?

Garnet doesn't yet have anything to add, but looks to Fate with sympathy to the pained recollection of her previous life. They'd never discussed Fate's past at length, but Garnet wanted to project that she didn't hold it against her, that what you do now, and tommorrow is more important, and that she had already proved the strength of her character to the Gem time and time again.

Garnet knows her confusion at the details revealed so far will become clearer as the others continue to discuss, so she continues to listen with patience and stoicism.

<Pose Tracker> Madoka Kaname [Ohtori Academy (9)] has posed.

The poking elicits the desired effect, as Madoka squeals, and when La Sirene smiles at her, she smiles back with a little extra warmth, above and beyond the usual, expected levels (which were already toasty).

And if Madoka has to be gagged with something, cocoa is the absolute best case scenario, and she submits to this treatment placidly. Inside Sayaka's cloak, she warms rapidly. Inside Sayaka's cloak is the safest place that Madoka knows. The only person it isn't safe for is Sayaka herself.

Her mind wanders as they discuss current events, her hand drifting down to take Sayaka's free one. The only part of the shared information that she seems to tune into is 'cruel to Mami', which gets her attention as precisely as a broadcast on her antenna's exact frequency. She jerks her chin, inhaling sharply with surprise and a little distress, which inadvertantly causes cocoa to first come in too quickly, then inexorably spill down said chin -- and onto Sayaka's beautiful cloak.

"Guh, sorry!!" she sputters, fighting for air. 'Death by chocolate' always sounded like a sexy cake, but the reality of it is surprisingly scary.

<Pose Tracker> Sayaka Miki [Ohtori Academy (9)] has posed.

"What?" Sayaka expels, leaning forward towards Nori in outrage, tilting Madoka with her. "What did they say to Mami-senpai? They better watch out... erp." Sayaka looks down at her cape. "It's fine, it's fine," she reassures Madoka. "I don't even have to wash it, it just comes back brand new every time..." Sayaka daubs at Madoka's mouth with her cape-shod hand, using the other to pat her back roughly. "You need the heimlich? No? Mouth to mouth?" Mischievously, Sayaka times her questions to when Madoka can't really answer.

Lest she interrupt, Sayaka finally rests her chin on Madoka's head and stays quiet as Chika explains, apparently coming to some conclusion as she thinks. She is not too distracted to take Madoka's hand and hold it, however. Fate has a new incident to bring to light, and Sayaka's eyes shift to her, trying to fit that in. A tension is rising in her that would have her thrumming like a plucked string under normal circumstances, but with Madoka cuddled up to her, hand in hand, there is a happy lassitude to soften the feelings.

"But..." Sayaka's arms squeeze Madoka tightly They were both there..

Wrapped up in a canvas tarp, soaked in sprinkler-water and rain, Yaori's body still felt so light.

"She's just a kid," Sayaka says. "Even if she has all that power, like Queen Beryl... I bet it's not her choice. No. I /know/ it's not her choice." This firm repetition is spoken directly to Fate. "There's no elementary schooler in the world who doesn't deserve a second chance, no matter what bad things they've done."

Looking away from Fate, a little shy from saying something unexpectedly intense, Sayaka clears her throat a little. "Anyway. The bright side is, I really don't think the Shepherds as a group are involved. Or else they'd have been there too, right? If I had to guess, I would say they don't even know about it..." There may be a note of forced hope there. "So there's no need for us to retaliate. This truce... we can stick to it for now. But I think we need to protect this Hotaru Tomoe, no matter what power she has. Do you all agree?"

<Pose Tracker> La Sirene de Diamant [Ohtori Academy (9)] has posed.

La Sirene is visibly flirting with the idea of saying 'she sounds like my kind of person' - it's a sort of playful quirk of the lips, a half-lidded indulgent look in her pale eyes - until Fate mentions that this Hotaru Tomoe BROKE BARDICHE.

At that exact moment her expression flashes to something much nearer to a horrified reaction. Batiste makes a similar face and they speak in chorus: "She did WHAT?"

The girl and the otter glance at each other for a moment.

La Sirene coughs delicately.

"... Perhaps she's holding a power she doesn't know how to control. You would be very foolish, I think, to provoke a person like that... to say nothing of it being abominable." She nods once to Sayaka, firmly, on the topic of protection.

"To answer your question - oh, it's awful. Are you certain you want to hear...?"

<Pose Tracker> Sayaka Miki [Ohtori Academy (9)] has posed.

"Yes!"

<Pose Tracker> Madoka Kaname [Ohtori Academy (9)] has posed.

"Yes!"

<Pose Tracker> La Sirene de Diamant [Ohtori Academy (9)] has posed.

"That horrid person, I think her name was Sailor Uranus? That sounds right, anyway," la Sirene continues, in light of such enthusiastic assent. "She told Mami-san, 'you had better keep your kohai away from me,' meaning us presumably..."

Dramatic pause. Batiste looks faintly apologetic for it.

"'Lest,'" La Sirene says, "'she run out.'"

"And she might as well have -- Punched her in the stomach," la Sirene says, narrowly avoiding the first thought of 'cut her arm off,' in light of Sayaka's presence. "They must have met before... Unless she was simply being cruel on general principles."

<Pose Tracker> Fate Testarossa [Infinity Institute (4)] has posed.

Flinching at La Sirene's chorus, she nods as if reaffirming that, looking up as otter and girl stare at each other. She just nods her head.

She starts a little when Madoka accidentally spills cocoa, and sputters, and stains that lovely white cloak. Then cringes over the fact she started. It's just that she's a little on edge after the situation with Hotaru the other day, and she knows it. Quickly she picks up her cocoa, and takes a sip.

It's heavenly sweetness, wrapped in such warmth is exactly what she needed right now. Putting the mug down, she says softly while Sayaka remains playful, "This is- really good cocoa. Thank you."

But then Sayaka- that older girl looks a bit stricken doesn't she? She slowly nods, as if she'd arrived at the same conclusions. That Hotaru wasn't doing this by choice, and even if she was, she deserved a second chance. She just hadn't told the Chevaliers because she was afraid they'd make the same decision as the Outer Senshi.

The fact that Sayaka instantly reaffirms that she wouldn't, made her believe in her decision to join all the more. Nodding Nori's way, as a possibility she hadn't considered, "I agree. We need to protect Hotaru Tomoe. And if the Shepherds- if they weren't involved- then maybe they still want peace. They'd have to, after what happened at..." She trails off, remembering that horrible event, "...the hospital."

But then she winces anew as La Sirene says that, and she nods, "That's... what she said." She confirms, giving Sayaka a worried look. How must Mami feel after something like that? How must Sayaka? "Sailor Pluto wasn't cruel, she was just serious." A beat, as she adds, "Very serious."

<Pose Tracker> Garnet [None] has posed.

Garnet listens intently, holding her cocoa and thinks she finally has gotten all the pieces to understand the situation. She she nods to Sayaka when the Puella suggests they protect this Hotaru Tomoe from the Senshi. Though Garnet's strategic practicality and merciliness in combat, makes it seems there's a possibility she might align with the Senshi, she only takes that option against full-fledged monsters, twisted beings made of dark magic itself that hold no heart and often have no free will. For those with even a glimmer of redemption, and the potential of the heart, she supports redemption and compromise, even though that path can sometimes be painful and fraught with disappointment.

Something she familiar with especially in the course of this conflict.

She wasn't fully aware a truce had been officially reached, (however she had noticed there had been no action by either side since Shinjuku) but though dissolution of that truce is a risk, she once again is stuck between what might be practical and what she knows is right.

These Senshi can't be allowed to murder Hotaru Tomoe as a first preventative measure, even under such delicate and dangerous circumstances. There has to be another way, and Garnet will help find it. The Gem doesn't know the depth of the other Shepherd's involvement, so when Sayaka questions it, she tries her best even with her recent anger to jump to conclusions. However, her previous experience with the group and their ethos leads her to believe that the others in their ranks, upon finding out, might gladly look the other way and allow the Senshi to do as they wish in the name of freedom for magical warriors to do what they want without consequence, regardless of what that might be.

Though her body language is supportive when the others speak, Garnet herself doesn't seem pleased in the slightest by these developments, in the spaces between active listening, her expression turns grim in thought, and she refrains from speech for now.

[OOC] Sayaka Miki says, "Me in this scene"
[OOC] Sayaka Miki http://safebooru.org//images/1044/189e62aee246a17536e60892f6b73c100c962f81.png
[OOC] Madoka Kaname says, "Truth"
[OOC] Garnet thumbsup
[OOC] Fate Testarossa says, "Hahaha"
[OOC] La Sirene de Diamant says, "hahahaha"

<Pose Tracker> Madoka Kaname [Ohtori Academy (9)] has posed.

Fate's compliment does not go disregarded, eliciting a pleasant bob, but there are more serious things at stake than cocoa. (Though, were the Kaname family recipe truly threatened with extinction, that might drive some hearts to know true despair...)

Madoka is often mistaken for an elementary school student herself, but when they talk about little kids with terrible power, and the need for second chances, her mind flashes between Homura Akemi side-eyeing her from over a shoulder, hair-flick and all --

-- and Tatsuya Kaname stomping around in his Godzilla costume. On top of cardboard cutouts of Mami, which go smush and smash and crash.

"That's horrible," she says in a much lower voice than usual. Sayaka can feel her trembling with overwrought feeling. Fury? Sadness? Guilt?

But there's no nuclear blast. Instead, after taking in a breath that pushes her back against Sayaka's belly, she smiles a tiny little smile.

"But it's okay. Because she never, ever will run out. We won't let that happen, ne?"

Homura firing a bullet into Alyssa's head transforms, in her mind's eye, to Sayaka's. Tatsuya writhes and warps, the toddler-bright swaddling of his costume becoming polka dots amid a sea of hungry black.

She squeezes Sayaka's hand.

No one's gonna lose anyone else. Not Mami, not any of them. Not Madoka herself.

It's a promise.

[OOC] Garnet says, "hahaha awwww that back and forth thought contrast is adorable"

<Pose Tracker> Sayaka Miki [Ohtori Academy (9)] has posed.

Sayaka, too, had worried that perhaps not all present would agree on this. Like many worries, it seems illusory in retrospect. They are all here because they agree on things like that. Even Madoka, right?

Sayaka blanches at the recitation of the insult. "You're right," she confirms softly. "Mami-senpai and that woman have fought before. More than once. It is," she agrees with Madoka. "Horrible."

Looking up, Sayaka takes a deep breath, which of course pushes Madoka's back a bit. "All right. We all agree then." Sayaka seems to speak 'silent Garnet' better than she used to. "If anyone sees Sailor Jupiter, or Sailor Moon or anyone, make sure they know we're behind them on this. Eheh." She scratches her cheek with a gloved finger. "I know some of you know Sailor Moon better than me..." Even after being a magical girl herself all this time, Sayaka still has a bit of hero-worship there.

Wrapping her arms around Madoka, Sayaka tilts back a bit and picks her up, making a theatrical groan as she stretches her back. "Oof. If it's okay with you, Chika-chan, maybe that's enough for today? We'll clear them all out eventually, don't worry." It isn't like Sayaka to be so conservative; there are still plenty of Familiars out there, and it isn't so late as all that. "My grades could use an early night," she grimaces ruefully, as if to explain. But if she's really thinking about school right now, why does she give Madoka a peck on the top of the head?

"I promise. It's a real promise, so believe me, okay?"

"I promise I'll stay with you."

[OOC] Sayaka Miki says, "The quote is from a scene where Sayaka and Madoka were cradling the dead body of the Puella Magi Eri killed"
[OOC] Sayaka Miki says, "Whereupon Sayaka promised to Madoka not to die"
[OOC] Madoka Kaname <3

<Pose Tracker> La Sirene de Diamant [Ohtori Academy (9)] has posed.

"I, at least, have no plans to go anywhere, any time soon," la Sirene says, with some pretention - but her heart behind it. Then she raises her cup of cocoa in salute and takes a deep draught of it.

"I'll remember," she adds, to Sayaka's remark on Sailor Moon.

<Pose Tracker> Fate Testarossa [Infinity Institute (4)] has posed.

Fate is no stranger to people saying cruel things.

I'VE ALWAYS HATED YOU!

None at all.

She watches one girl squeeze another's hand. Her eyes follow Sayaka as she gives Madoka a peck on the top of the head.

It starts with a sound. A low whine, like a siren. The only warning for a girl who clambers to a balcony window. There's a bright light in the distance. A place where even the small child knows her Mama works. Then it's so bright it's like looking into the heart of a star. Then nothing.

The girl pinches her eyes shut for a moment, as if clearing the spots out of her eyes, then there's a smile there again, "We definitely won't let that happen." She says quietly, echoing Madoka.

Her life isn't worth any one of theirs- she's not even a real girl. And she'd make any sacrifice to protect all of their smiles.

But then the seriousness of the moment fades away and she's just a girl who wants to enjoy her cup of cocoa, "Ah- if you need help on your math homework. I'd be happy to help."

It might seem like a useless offer, a futile one that comes from the mouths of babes that can't understand the horror of middle school math until, "I sometimes help tutor high schoolers."

<Pose Tracker> La Sirene de Diamant [Ohtori Academy (9)] has posed.

La Sirene and Batiste pull the same face they did upon hearing that Hotaru Tomoe /broke Bardiche/ when they find out that Fate can /tutor high school math/.

<Pose Tracker> Garnet [None] has posed.

Garnet watching Sayaka and Madoka, remembers her cocoa, and sips it, her face reacting to the unexpected power of the Kaname family cocoa recipe. The Gem was glad they had all again come to an agreement so quickly.

That they so strongly adhered to the path of altruism, protection and mercy was refreshing in the face of so many like Sailor Uranus and Kyouko Sakura, to say nothing of the forces of evil, the demons that lurk in the dark, and the others, those so-called "princes" that tried to steal the Key, who let their selfishness run so deep as to become an existential threat to all others. There's no forseeable end to the foes they face, no end to the battles ahead.

The ancient Gem has no school to worry about so if Chika wants to press on with the familiar extermination, she'll help her as much as she can.

But for now, Garnet, decides to sit and enjoy this respite and the company of the others. Even when you can keep your eyes on the future, literally rather than figuratively, and a part of her wants to, another part shouts its insistence that it's just as important not to forget to live in and enjoy the present.