Plank Sinatra

Nova Lux: A Magical Girl Game

For all her bluster and optimism in the face of getting past the Void, as well as the fact that she clearly rated the girls' chances higher than Astrelle or the survivors of the control room, Nicole's good cheer did have his limits. Like Dana and Astrelle, she did an anxious double take at the figures of Victoria Glass and another woman fighting. The startled reactions were right; that could only be another Ars Magi, wielding a blade that seemed as close to a forged lightning bolt as anything Nicole had ever seen. Astrelle gave voice to her incredulity.

“What is Victoria doing? She’s—It looks like she’s fighting another Ars Magi. That’s absurd. Who’s going to help Penny and Vanna?”

Aww, shit, so you do care...

Still, it was hard not to silently agree with her. Nicole had really banked on the Wing to help bail the girls out of trouble, but seeing, for herself, two Ars Magi dueling to the death...it was impossible for her to wrap her mind around. Maybe they had all died in the crash after all, this was some kind of shared hell where they were all trapped in Penny and Dana's cartoons, and one of them had accidentally conjured up some cruel, sexy rival character who had fallen from grace. Or maybe they were alive, those conspiracy sites were right, and there were such things as Ars Magi who acted as mercenaries - or even worse, cabals who were capable of even worse schemes, things that precocious girls like them - well, like Dana, Penny, and Nicole - were capable of imagining. Nicole really didn't give a fuck about the explanation behind the current situation. What mattered was that the girls were back there, they were stuck here, and Victoria was out of reach. If staying behind to fight one Void was basically suicide, then going out to help Victoria in their states would be about as helpful as a staring contest with a solar flare.

"I'm going back for them," she volunteered, aiming her smile at Astrelle Lennox - a look with good cheer to rival Penny and Dana, with some cheekiness for flavor and an implicit hint of understanding. "We've done all we can for this guy, and he's in better hands than ours. None of us are gonna turn the tide up there. Dana's put herself through a lot already, and you're probably happy in the control room, right, babe? One trip was probably stressful enough."

What had been an implicit hint grew more pronounced, and she stuck up a peace sign over one eye.

"If I die, you two were totally my favorite classmates. Back in a sec."

With a wink, and the same grace she had avoided injury with during the ship's descent, Nicole took a small leap behind her, sprung her second foot backwards, and skipped back down the hall like a stone towards her other new friends.

Nova Lux: A Magical Girl Game

---

Nicole cringed at the sight and sound of Penny being slammed against the wall. Instinctively she lurched forward to help, especially after the noise of pain Penny made when that awful thing grabbed her arm and torqued it as easily as one of them would twist the cap on a bottle. It didn't matter that she knew about as much about bare knuckle boxing or martial arts as your average toddler - most of the girls had hit it off on the spot, and the pain of one felt like an assault on all of them. Well, maybe not Astrelle, but some people were just works in progress, right? How many times did she hear one of her girlfriends use the I can fix her? line about a guy?

Usually it sounded pathetic when one of them said it, but y'know, shelve that right now, Nicole, things to do, Voids to exorcise.

Instead, Nicole responded to Dana's distress, scooping up the wounded soldier as best she could to take some weight off Dana. Here, I got him. Good job with the first aid, babe. You're doing great." She smiled at the Norban girl reassuringly and scooted closer to the wounded man. Hefting him upright seemed easier with two of them than one; she could see Dana's unsteady trembling starting to ease, but it also had the added effect of taking another girl, untrained as Nicole was, out of the fight. Vanna would need to step in fast if one of them was going to help Penny.

"We have to get him around this thing," she urged Dana. "Vanna's helping Penny and making an opening for us - you're doing great, babe!" The arm she had braced the soldier with stiffened slightly, and she made a little finger gun that fired appreciatively at the Duodecim girl, along with her best supportive, beaming smile. "When she does, I'm gonna take most of his weight and make a jump for it. I think I can get across. You can either run across, or I can make another jump over for you--or maybe Astrelle can help, since someone's gonna have to keep this guy standing."

Nova Lux: A Magical Girl Game

---

Nicole's breath left her lungs for a moment at the sight of the Void's savagery. It was strange - an airship crash, the screaming and gnashing of metal and wood around her, had left her serenely calm, and yet this...this...an airship crash sucked, but at least it was an act of God. This was something else.

Penny, no doubt similarly terrified beyond measure, charged right in without consulting any of them. Before Nicole could even call out for her to wait, the bespectacled girl ran in with a war cry to haymaker the Void with as much lightning and power as her little body could cook with. Dana was doing her thing on the guard, probably saving his life, which almost brought a smile to Nicole's face despite herself. Even Astrelle's snide, panicked barbs didn't quite touch the fuzzy feeling that Dana's act of altruism gave her...

...although it did make her roll her eyes a little.

“I’m so excited to be an Ars Magi. Wouldn’t it be so fun to be impaled by a Void like the poor guard? Unfortunately, my abilities aren’t suited for fighting. The most I can do is act as a guard dog for your backs, or I can go and try to find Victoria.”

Nicole tilted her head and smiled back.

"Well, you and me both. So why don't we both go ahead together? Maybe find Victoria, maybe find some answers, maybe die screaming. Your date, your call, babe."

Nova Lux: A Magical Girl Game

---

Maybe she should have asked one of the sailors if it was okay to invoke a doomed ship on a voyage, because when Laurus jolted underneath them, it reeked of such perfect ironic timing that Nicole wondered if she'd cursed them all.

She had never before felt the surface buckle underneath her the way that the ship did then, a sudden lurch that left her with the sick feeling of her organs having to catch up with their proper positions. She watched the other girls lose their footing one by one, heads and limbs slamming into the room that had been so comforting moments ago. Even with the ship's screams of protest overwhelming her ears, somehow she could make out the yelps and cries of pain from her fellow would-be students. Wait, would-be?

Is this it? We're not even gonna see the school? Fuck, dude.

Fuck, dude? The strange serenity of her reaction surprised her, even in the split second she could register it. She supposed that was who she was: Nicole Cognoscenti, queen of vibes, always going with the flow. Even at the end, her smile would be on the wind.

--and then the gods noticed her, and decided it was her turn to be tossed about.

The ship bucked again with a squeal of metal, and Nicole was launched off her feet, thrown in the same direction as the table she'd been snacking from minutes previously. One of the other girls hurtled past her, and Nicole reached for her hand out of desperate impulse - Astrelle's, maybe, or Dana's or even Vanna's - but the girl was gone before their fingers could do more than brush. The table had slammed into a wall, two of its wooden legs snapped off. It was a recipe for impalement; at best she would slam into the table face first, and after that any case she might have had for being the prettiest girl in the class would be dead in the water.

My smile is on the wind.

Nicole closed her eyes, let go of her body, and smiled.

She felt herself curl up into a ball and undergo a single, controlled somersault. When she had finished her rotation, her legs outstretched, and the tip of her boot bounced off the shrapnel-studded wooden surface as easily as it would have bounced off a trampoline. While she was in the air, the ship's uncontrolled fall into hell finally halted, and the girls began to haul themselves upright from whatever they'd grabbed onto or fallen against. Nicole, the lone girl still suspended in the air, was panting softly when she landed on her feet, but it was hard to wipe the goofy, exhilarated grin off her face. The whole thing, from initial turbulence to her graceful magic gymnastic routine, felt like the longest hour of Nicole's life.

It had only been six seconds.

She looked around to see if everyone was okay. Most of them looked sore, slightly ruffled up, but like they could handle themselves in what seemed like an imminent fight. Vanna was already giving out orders about as effectively as any veteran Wing of Justice, even though inside she must have been as taken aback as the rest of them. While she was talking, Nicole bent down to pick up her beret. She pouted slightly when she saw a couple condiment smears from one of the sandwiches, but pulled it back on, just facing in a different direction from the rest of the girls. Hopefully her hair was enough of a mess to distract from that kind of thing anyway, and besides, who was she going to be vain for? Vanna? Astrelle? The giant demon eye from the blackest flames of hell?

If that was her audience, she would rock her mayo beret with pride.

"Speaking of people, and uh, help, and all," she said, once she had collected enough breath and felt the tingles of her instinctive magical display fading from her extremities. "How far could the Wing of Justice have gotten? Hopefully she's not too beat up to pitch in, but either way, I kinda want a couple answers. 'Cause I'm feeling a little screwed right about now. Anyone else feel like she definitely knew we were getting perved on by that giant eye? Not just me, right?

The Zephyr Extinct

I R I S

Shit. Oh shit.

"Get to Archer," she ordered urgently, pulling away from Cedar. "Tell her about the ring, tell her, uhh, I'll bring it back with me. That--"

She jerked her hand up to the rooftop the guy had landed on. The confluence of healer's robes around this initial assignment today can't have been a coincidence. The sky over Rig was growing murkier; the storm she had scouted out was growing closer, and she could tell it was connected to this corpse, and to the orange robes she'd seen standing out amidst orange flames. They almost burnt that girl up there.

Determined, Iris' brow set beneath her ornate mask.

"I gotta handle that," she said. With the easy grace of the city's high-fliers, and with a speed and agility that belied her size, the big girl leapt from alley to vine and began clambering up the side of the spice shop. If she hurried, she could keep track of him. He was wearing a pretty big target, after all.

Nova Lux: A Magical Girl Game

---

Nicole grinned at Penny's enthusiasm. She guessed that if her image of Hasta came from what she was able to see on the Web, it was understandable how it would seem like paradise. Hell, it was paradise. Coming where she'd come from, more privileged than most but not as well-off as some, it was hard not to feel almost...almost like she was living within a snow globe. Just an everyday girl going about her life beneath lights that were always perfect, and so never felt the need to change.

"It is pretty cool," she agreed, winking at the other girl. "But not exactly like what you might see online. The reality is that heritage buildings like that, especially ones that survived from the old days, require some real upkeep, even in this day and age. Even people who live there can't always visit. Lotta magitech goes into keeping them functioning, and there's always some support or observation deck that needs restoring every year. But yeah, prrr-etty cool. Romantic, if you ever get the chance."

Here she was, giving out romantic advice like some kind of wise older sister, when the best she could do was bump knuckles with a boy she'd loved since elementary school. Romantic. Yeah. So you can do your best Eradicator impersonation and shoot finger guns at a boy when he's saying goodbye. It's basically a frickin' proposal...

"It's definitely the City of Lights, too. I think it's prettiest in the rain, when you can see everything in the city fizzle. Not so great if you like to stargaze, but I never really minded. You should stick with Hasta, though," she advised knowingly. "You'll sound like a real tourist if you call it Paris, though."

The Zephyr Extinct

Post will be up tonight or tomorrow!

Nova Lux: A Magical Girl Game

---

Yikes. I guess people aren't into goth girls because they're chatty, right?

Nicole let it be for now, half because she was trying to decide whether or not she dug Astrelle's vibes, too, and half because she was currently wondering whether invoking the name of a crashed airship onboard one currently in flight was, itself, a case of bad vibes. She gulped down the nibble of sandwich she was working on - just in case they were really crashing, so she wouldn't have to die with food in her mouth like a slob - and, when the turbulence settled itself, took a bite of another. In the absence of the Wing of Justice, the girls started to talk to themselves about daytime cartoons and their families, in the same breath.

It was interesting hearing everyone's backgrounds and perspectives. They were all so alien to Nicole. The vibe philosopher finally set down her sandwich and chimed in, a little sheepishly.

"I guess I'm the weirdo," she explained. "I was an only child, and uh..." She looked around, especially between Penny and Dana. "I don't really know what you're talking about with Alexis and Glenda or whoever. I'm an Eradicator II: See You in Hell kinda girl."

Nova Lux: A Magical Girl Game

---

Nicole giggled too, sitting up straighter and kicking both her legs up over the armrest of her chair. She decided to try and enjoy her sandwich a little bit, since she wasn't sure when they would get to eat again upon arrival. Her stomach fluttered between bites, though, and she already knew she would be unable to finish even half. In the relative solitude of her cabin, between thoughts of excelling in school and dropping the ball on kisses, focusing on the occasional pangs of hunger had kept her grounded. But now she was here, and he excitement of it all - new classmates, new cities, a complete shift in the course of her life - had pretty much killed those cravings. Instead, she settled for breaking off little pieces of focaccia and nibbling on them while Astrelle spoke.

"Two years ago," she responded in the affirmative. "My parents and I went as a reward for, uh..."

She snapped her fingers, still trying to remember. So much of her childhood revolved around one good cause or another. They were all worthwile, but each demanded its own energy from her parents, and each had involved Nicole in whatever small way she could. The scope compounded; sometimes it could grow exhausting juggling it all, and that was for her as a kid, handing out stickers or selling chocolate bars or whatever. She knew it had to be worse for her folks. So by the time she had discovered her magical potential...well, that just meant she had to find the energy somewhere.

"Some benefit or another. I think it was, like, funds for the Castor families?" Now that she thought about it, that sounded right. Castor had been an airship that had disappeared around that time, carrying some minor dignitaries amidst a flock of innocent civilians. Since the brunt were from Valentia, multiple benefactors from her sister city had gone about raising funds as relief for victims' families, the Cognoscenti family among them. Riiiight. "We spent about a week. I spent a lot of the time with my parents or at the arcades, but I managed to sneak into a club or two and hear some music between all the speeches." She grinned playfully.

Nova Lux: A Magical Girl Game

---

Nicole watched the other four girls introduce themselves, each of them getting a big smile and a cocked head to denote varying interest levels. Penny and Dana seemed like sweet girls, a pair of chatterboxes that reminded her of the kids in her neighborhood back in Hasta. Children had always sensed something about Nicole that she herself was ignorant of, and had tagged along with her in the hopes that she would invent an adventure for them to go on. When she was twelve or thirteen, it used to bother her more. After she discovered her magical potential, though, she found it more exciting. Children were super-spreaders when it came to adventure and fun, and Nicole had found herself easily infected by their zeal. Penny and Dana seemed like two such fun-loving girls, and Nicole was sure they would be friends in no time.

On the other hand, she definitely wouldn't need Victoria Glass' help to point out the nobles. They were both gorgeous, and completely at odds - light and dark, both seeming to want nothing to do with the other. Vanna's lineage would be familiar to almost anyone alive. She had never seen a member of the Duodecim this close before, and Nicole would be insane not to be a little bit starstruck. But Vanna seemed down-to-earth enough for a member of one of the planet's most celebrated, powerful families. Maybe it was a 'second daughter, not an immediate heiress' kinda thing. Secure the bag and forge your own path, that sounded good.

The other girl, Astrelle, was the only one who hadn't called out where she hailed from, but if Victoria's words to her hadn't clued Nicole in the Lennox daughter's accent definitely would. Her eyes brightened when she realized there was a girl who was (in a global sense, anyway) just down the road from her onboard. It would be nice to have someone else who had some idea of things she was talking about, if she ever talked about home. She waved her fingers at the other Venusian, with her cheek still balanced on her knee, and shot her a big, friendly grin.

"Hey," she said good-naturedly, lifting her cheek up to balance her chin on her crooked knee again. She wrapped both hands around her right ankle after she was done with her greeting wave, rocking back and forth slightly. "I know who you are - well, like, your family, at least. How often do you make it over to Hasta?"