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There was a valuable lesson at the heart of all the chaos and bullshit here: from today until their deaths, there would never be such a thing as a sure bet for an Ars Magi. But it was a lesson Nicole really hoped they would get to around day...thirty. Ten. At least day two. No learning quite like accelerated learning!

[color=39b54a]"Girls, much as this is fun, I think we need to find a way to catch that thing before it flies off with Lennox. I'm guessing we can all jump real high with our new abilities, but I'm talking about if anyone thinks they can just up and fly, that would really be useful right now. We can try to hit the monster from this range, but don't hit Astrelle!"[/color]

[color=ec008c]"I couldn't if I tried,"[/color] Nicole jested, eyeing the serpents tepidly. Truth be told, as jarring as it was to see the Void take flight - especially with her erstwhile roommate - and as much as it would have terrified her even days ago, right now, she found anything in the sky preferable to dealing with the serpents it had begat. In the skies, she felt at home. [color=ec008c]"Penny, you two keep on top of things down here. Dana -"[/color] she winked [color=ec008c]" - you're doing great, babe. Keep out of range and--"[/color]

One of the Void-spawn had lunged, and Nicole's swipe with her sabre punished it for the attempt. The winds that sheathed the blade cleaved the monster back into the pools of ink it crawled from. 

[color=ec008c]"--and just keep blasting. Gotta fly. I'll be back with her!"[/color]

She made a break for it, springing off the ground and lightly tapping the stump that now topped the remains of the light Penny had obliterated. She shoved off the twisted, bifurcated metal pole and did her best to soar.

Truthfully, 'felt natural to her' didn't even come close to the sensations. While it was true that all the Ars Magi likely had some degree of agility beyond what they had ever imagined, in her soul Nicole could feel that her case was different. When anything else in the world jumped, be it man, beast, or magical girl, it came down. But not Nicole. She descended on her own terms.

She could see the Void, a cruel distortion of a raven's shape, with Astrelle fighting valiantly in its clutches. She could imagine the cynical thoughts about death and abandonment racing through her roommate's head at the moment. Thoughts of how they had all been tricked into this somehow, led astray by parents or society, how fighting for something as nebulous was saving the world was a dream for the stupid or the catatonic. Honestly, some of them might even have been warranted. But that wouldn't make those anxieties any less fun to prove wrong. 

Nicole felt grateful for Palmyra's urban sprawl for the first time; though utilitarian, that also meant it was consistent, and she had no shortage of fire escapes to leap from in order to continue gaining momentum as she built up to sustained flight. With a sweep of her sword she summoned a current to beat against the wings of the Void; they had transfigured in a hurry, and they looked sickly and ill-made. Even a novice Ars Magi like her, she reasoned, would have enough juice in her to prevent such a pitiful creature from escaping. From there, it was a matter of cutting Astrelle down. Her scythe was absolutely [i]not[/i] the weapon of choice for dealing with captivity like this, but even Nicole's sword required a precision cut - and a leap of faith on both their parts.

[color=ec008c]"Trust me!"[/color] Nicole yelled, grinning with all the optimism and grace she had in her, trying to make herself heard to her fellow Ars Magi over the winds. She swung the sword again, trying to cleave off the sickly, thin-looking talons that clutched Astrelle. [color=ec008c][i]So I can't be the Ars Magi that saves the world. Fuck it.[/i][/color]

Expensive boots stamped on a cigarette long extinguished, balanced on the pitted metal of a balcony long abandoned. With a mighty, selfless heave, they abandoned their perch - and Nicole Cognoscenti flew.

[color=ec008c][i]I can just be the one that saves the girl.[/i][/color]