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Magical Starlight

Summary:

With the mysterious advent of nightmarish fiends undeterred by any power but the magic of music, it was only natural that the age of girl bands would be followed by the age of magical girls, those chosen to wield the sacred power of song to safeguard their world. Poppin' Party, a fledgling girls' band turned fledgling magical girl team, must do everything in their capacity to not only overcome the monstrous Dissonants but also to withstand the burden of being a magical girl, and their perilous, cutthroat community.

Chapter 1: Night of the Hunt

Chapter Text

Sunset brought with it the mists, the scurrying grey rising from the gutters in foggy fingers that reached lazily for any sign of life in the streets. With them came the shutting of windows, the hastening of footsteps. Not one soul bothered to acknowledge Kasumi as she passed them by; she would have hoped that responsible adults would tell her that it was not safe for a young girl all alone to roam the streets after nightfall. Instead they hurried to find whatever shelter they could, cursing themselves for still being out in the streets right as the mists began to rise.

Kasumi carried on in the opposite direction, minding her own business, an upbeat song blaring from her earbuds. Arisa always reprimanded her for that, saying that it made her careless and unaware of her surroundings, but Arisa was not with her right now, was she?

Scattered along the usually-crowded streets were several stores that garishly advertised that they were open 24/7, and - in far smaller lettering, almost as an afterthought - displayed current sales and services, along with their prices. That wasn’t surprising, for ever since the mists began to haunt the world every night, it didn’t really matter what a store had for sale, only that it was open in the first place. The world could not afford to entirely stop, after all, even after nightfall. As soon as people realized that the mists and the Dissonants were not the immediate end of all things, they demanded that life returned to some strained normality.

Truth was, Kasumi preferred it that way. It was better than seeing a world living as though it were under siege, looking through her window and watching as the mists consumed everything and everyone in their path, shivering with uncertainty, not knowing if the walls would hold and the lights would last. But with the birth of the magical girls, the lights found their guardians, and life could go on, precarious as it could be at times.

The usual convenience store was deserted but for the cashier, a girl not much older than Kasumi herself. The faint whir of a generator in the background indicated that this place was guarded from the unlikely blackout, and the azure gleam coming from behind the safe room’s door was proof of a prepared Faelight, so that the worst would not come to pass.

As long as the magical girls could come in time to provide a rescue, that is. Though the world went on taking the proper precautions against the Dissonants that hunted these nights, even holding on to a certain sense of security, all these precautions would amount to nothing if, as the darkest hours of the night stretched on, no magical girls came to their aid. As Kasumi browsed the shelves of the convenience store, she found cookie packages with the familiar faces of Aya Maruyama and Chisato Shirasagi, and on bottles of soda she found Maya Yamato and Eve Wakamiya. If a place as humble as this was assaulted by Dissonants, would Pastel Palettes come to save it? Kasumi rather doubted it. She only saw Pasupare called to action when it was time for grandiose battles, the kind that made national news

“That’ll be all this time,” said Kasumi, suddenly self-conscious about how scarce her purchases were tonight. Snacks for five every night took their toll on her wallet, even as they took turns buying the required supplies for a long, tiresome night.

“Things really have gotten so expensive, haven’t they?” The girl asked, staring at the price on the screen as she scanned a big bottle of soda. “Goodness, nowadays you can’t even get kidney stones if you’re not rich.”

“Tell me about it,” Kasumi whined. “Arisa says it’s good because it means I have to improve my diet, but I see how disappointed she gets when the bags are a little lighter than last time.”

“Maybe they won’t be so light this evening,” she said, discreetly putting a few goods into one of the plastic bags, discretion totally unnecessary in the absence of any onlookers.

“Oh, you don’t need to… I couldn’t possibly have you-”

“Don’t worry about it,” she said. “It’s not much, anyways, but I can tell just how diligent you’ve been. I appreciate that. Everyone in the area appreciates that.”

Kasumi wondered if she could somehow tell that this appreciation was not shown as often as might be proper. She didn’t fight for the sake of praise, of course, but every time she passed by the huge billboards using the likeness of a Pasupare member to advertise fancy goods, Kasumi found herself longing for some acknowledgment, for someone to recognize that their nights were long and dangerous, that they were always hard at work, the five members of Poppin’ Party.

But frowns poisoned the soul, so Kasumi waved goodbye with a smile and set towards their usual meeting place, making sure to check her phone to see if she might not have missed any important messages. Arisa and Saya had already arrived, while Tae and Rimi would be coming by one of the rare night buses that hadn’t been decommissioned for the sake of cutting costs. It was a fine way to get the measure of the city streets as night veiled Tokyo and the mists began to stir. That meant plenty of time for Kasumi to meet with the others without drawing the ire of Arisa for being the last to arrive.

Where a minute ago there had been a few hurried figures rushing towards some shelter, there now was the disquieting emptiness of nightfall. The last lingering traces of the sun were swallowed by a deep darkness, and the streetlights seemed few and far between. Drawn to their luminosity, the Dissonants greedily consumed the light, to return only when sunrise banished them. Large luminous signs flickered in the distance, advertisements as always, but what had once been the familiar ambiance of a great city was now eerie, for such lights would not endure dusk’s embrace. It was always uncomfortable to watch them slowly fade as the city became a sea of blackness with islands of lingering lights. Here and there they would shine brighter, magical Faelights conjured from the Realm Beyond, but their saintly light was feebler, subtler, noticeable mostly from up close, just as the light they brought.

A light shone from the rooftops; their meeting place. Emergency ladders led Kasumi ever higher, towards heights that once had induced vertigo but now had become almost commonplace. There was no better place than some of the highest points of the city to allow them to dutifully scan where the Dissonants gathered in greater numbers. The rooftops of Tokyo belonged to the magical girls, who by decree could traverse them undisturbed. It was very rare for anyone to be so bold as to file noise complaints against their own guardians, although it happened sometimes; Kasumi recalled the time an outsider had come to CiRCLE to air his grievances with the magical girls thinking they could interrupt his sleep by jumping from roof to roof chasing ghosts. If Yukina Minato’s cold stare hadn’t been enough to cow the fool into compliance, then surely Sayo Hikawa’s words would have done so.

“Very well,” she said serenely, “if you are so sorely irked, then next time we will allow the Dissonants to slaughter you and your family, as you seem to wish.”

Following that, they’d been mostly allowed to carry on their duties without outside interference, able to discuss their issues among themselves, gathering at CiRCLE where whatever conflicts they might have had - and for some, like Afterglow, there were plenty of those - were to be disregarded in the interest of neutrality. Kasumi wasn’t attending as many of those meetings as she perhaps should, as Arisa constantly reminded her, but the truth was that a magical girl’s place was not in those councils, but in the city, beneath the stars.

She found Arisa and Saya waiting for her at the edge of the building’s rooftop, watching the city below as slowly the darkness spread across the grid-like arrangement of the streets. It was strange that one could ever get used to such a fearsome sight, but Kasumi did, or at least she was used enough that it no longer paralyzed her. Below them, vehicles seemed like dots of light, but tonight they were sparser than usual. Hopefully that meant less danger.

“Arisa, Saya,” Kasumi greeted them, then handed over some of the plastic bags. Saya had brought her own bread, as always, and they smelled even more delicious than usual. Small luxuries such as that helped these nights feel more like a gathering of friends than them putting their lives at risk for the sake of the world around them. It was better to think this way, Kasumi had found. “Hope you weren’t getting bored waiting.”

“Oh, not at all,” said Saya, smiling. Arisa, meanwhile, was locked in an annoyed frown as she stared at her phone. “Arisa has been looking at social media and news, keeping track of any unusual sightings. Lisa told us that if she hears of any possible leads near us, she’ll send them our way.”

“That’s nice of her,” said Kasumi. In spite of their somewhat sinister aesthetics and reputation as harsh and cold, Kasumi had always found the members of Roselia to be kind and agreeable, if excessively serious at times. But this was a serious matter. “Anything from O-Tae and Rimi-rin?” 

“Sounds like they’re right behind you,” said Saya, “they told us they reached the area just a few minutes after you did, so it seems you’ve missed each other.”

“Bummer…” She stepped towards Arisa. “Say, Arisa… Whatcha looking at that’s got you frowning like that?”

“Haha,” Saya intervened before Arisa had the chance to explode, “she’s in a bad mood because, well, CiRCLE kind of screwed us over…”

“More like CiRCLE ratfucked us without even buying us dinner, the cunts,” said Arisa. Despite Saya’s efforts, her temper had just gotten triggered, and when it did so, there was no stopping her. “Look at this shit, Kasumi, look at it!”

Arisa practically shoved her phone on Kasumi’s face, but she couldn’t quite tell what exactly she was looking at. They seemed to be pictures of that one card game that had just gotten quite popular lately, but Kasumi really didn’t know a thing about it other than it had been a big hit, using the likeness of magical girls working under CiRCLE’s management.

“Uh, what exactly am I looking for?”

“Seems CiRCLE didn’t waste their time selling our image rights to this card game for nerds,” Arisa whined, “putting us into the game’s new expansion.”

“What, isn’t that cool?” Kasumi asked. “I mean, it sucks that they didn’t ask us for permission, but anything that puts our name out there can’t be anything but good, right?”

“Yeah, no, I was reading the comments about the new cards. Apparently the Pasupare girls got new Hyper Secret Holo Rare cards that are worth a big deal of cash and are super overpowered, but us? Look what this son of a bitch had the audacity to say about my card! Wow, this is so useless, why do they even print these cards nobody’s gonna play with, just to fill up space? What a ripoff! A ripoff’s what your dad called your whore mom when he did her for a hundred yen in some public bathroom!” With each word she said, her fingers followed, so it seemed Arisa was picking fights online again. “I hope a Dissonant eats him.”

“You don’t mean that,” said Kasumi, taking her phone from her hands before Arisa had the chance to say something that would get her tar and feathered online. At least she had the common sense not to use an account that could be easily linked to Arisa Ichigaya, Poppin’ Fuschia of the magical girl team Poppin’ Party. As if they weren’t already having a hard enough time getting public support. “I didn’t expect you to care so much about something like that.”

“It didn’t help that earlier today we finally got our first email peddling a sponsorship,” said Saya, mildly embarrassed. “It was… Not flattering.”

“Why do the other magical girls get to advertise normal shit like cosmetics or cute clothes or appear in TV shows while we have to hear some shit-eater say he’d loooove it if we could do an ad for fucking hemorrhoids cream?!”

“Oh,” that was, indeed, pretty grave. Nevertheless, Kasumi still felt she should ask: “Was the pay any good?”

“Not good enough to throw away our pride like that!” Arisa yelled. Kasumi felt very sorry for anyone in the vicinity. “It’s not even like we want to sell out like Pasupare or something, but saving the world isn’t cheap, you know? Kind of outrageous how we’re expected to answer every emergency when we don’t even get help for the subway fare!”

“I agree with Arisa there,” said Saya. “Staying up late every night hasn’t been great for my sleep, and it’s been affecting my grades at school… Studying together is great, but I have to help my family and O-Tae has her own job too, and I was thinking about getting tutored to help me with my studies but I don’t really think we can afford that right now…”

“Sometimes it really does feel like it’s easier to gather Notes than yen,” Kasumi sighed. When they were felled, the Dissonants were not at all stingy with the Notes that burst forth from their fading remains, but that wasn’t exactly useful currency outside magical girl circles. “But it’s not worth getting mad over, right? In the end, we love what we do, having the chance to make the world better.”

“Would be nice if the world appreciated it,” said Arisa. “Did you know Pasupare are flown by helicopter to their battlefields? Sure must be nice to get help to preserve your energy like that… Jumping from rooftop to rooftop, transformed, is so draining to our strength that I did some quick maths and it turned out that we spend almost half of every night just recouping the Notes we burn up moving around. Being a magical girl is suffering.”

“Aw, Arisa, come here,” Kasumi pulled her close, hugging her tight. “There, that oughta energize you.”

“Dumbass,” she said, but hadn’t made any attempt at letting go of the embrace. Moments after, the noise of footsteps on metal announced the arrival of Tae and Rimi. The usual greetings followed, a quick opportunity to catch up on each other’s day.

But with the darkness came also their duty, a reminder that this time they spent together was not truly time spent casually, as it had been in the past, when they met together in Arisa’s basement to simply chat and goof off. That levity was gone now. Once they were properly caught up, Arisa walked up towards the edge, teetering uncomfortably close to it. Extending her hand, she whispered the incantation to call forth her magic, in the form of a line of translucent piano keys as colorful as a prism, and began to play her first few notes, gently and slowly giving birth to the beginnings of a melody. Fittingly, matching her melody, the Notes in her own heart blossomed from her body one by one, dimly glittering before fading, a song coming to life before their very eyes. It was a spectacle to behold, one Kasumi had not yet grown accustomed to, and this was nothing compared to the rainbows that unfurled during battle, each slightest bit of their magic releasing a corresponding Note.

Long lines of light rushed towards the horizon, briefly illuminating the city below. Dozens of them followed Arisa’s commands, disappearing into the distance only to return moments later, coalescing into tiny gems sparkling around Arisa, circling her body. Gently she put a finger on each one of them; some shattered into white sparks, while others darkened, lingered. By the end of it, there were six of the latter. Six arcane wisps that had detected the taint of Dissonance as they flew over this area of the city.

“Looks like a bountiful night,” said Tae. “Last night it was just three, and few others manifested over the deep dark hours.”

“Thank goodness,” Rimi breathed a sigh of relief, smiling only when she was offered a treat by Saya. “I was feeling a little anxious about my reserves after last night… I definitely used up more Notes than I’d gained.”

“Are you running low on them, Rimi-rin?” Kasumi asked. Rimi just shook her head.

“Not yet, but I would have to start conserving them pretty strictly if we had another bad night or two… Ah, but I feel a little bit guilty about being happy about Dissonants…”

“Well, we’re not happy about it,” said Tae. “But we can handle them before they claim any victims, so it’s not bad to be relieved we’ll get a reward and get to keep fighting. Then we can hopefully get ourselves some goodies from CiRCLE.”

“I’ve had my eyes on some cute wings, myself,” said Kasumi. “They’re rather pricey, though, but wouldn’t it be so cool?”

“Sounds tacky to me,” said Arisa. “And flying with those must be a pain in the ass.”

“Aw, sounds like someone’s cranky she can’t afford fancy wings to fly with me,” Kasumi smiled. Arisa grumbled, which was a rather subdued reaction. “Do you have any plans on your next purchase? I hear CiRCLE got access to a new selection of treasures from the Realm Beyond, even if they’re a bit expensive since everyone wants them.”

“I’ll just get some bombs of faemake, I think,” said Arisa. “Invisibility, intangibility, in addition to good old magic explosions… I think they’d be useful.”

“I’ve never bought those,” admitted Rimi. “It feels so bad spending precious Notes on something I’ll only use once, especially something that’ll literally explode…”

“I get that,” said Saya. “They feel so precious I always end up thinking I’d best use them when there’s no other choice, but I always save them for later…”

“The colors when they go boom are pretty, though,” said Tae. “And they’re so exciting. Haven’t you guys ever wanted to perform at a concert with flames bursting from the ground or something? I think that’s so cool. And you can get all sorts of colors for the fires, too.”

“Yeah, no, I think your issue is you’re not frugal enough ,” said Arisa. “Either way, we’re not getting any of these trinkets or spells without Notes, so let’s get moving, shall we? Let me take a look at what my wisps detected,” she peered into the remaining gems, and images appeared within them, though Kasumi could not make sense of what they could be. “Lucky us, they’re still in the process of manifesting, the mists are still only gathering, but no Dissonants have come to life. The one that’s closest to emerging is also the closest one to our position. Just some minutes from here, one block north of the train station… We’ll have a few more hours until the faintest one manifests, so we could try to expand our hunting grounds a little tonight, see if we can’t catch a few more Dissonants outside our usual areas. We’ll have plenty of time, so I reckon there’s no risk in it.”

Kasumi nodded. It was always ideal when a night turned out to have such a lenient pace in spite of plentiful apparitions from the shadows. It offered them time to recover after each battle, to rethink their approach if necessary, to try and arrange reinforcements if things turned out hairy. And, should further Dissonants rise from the shadows as the night went on, they would have the opportunity to decide if they should take them on themselves for further recompense or if they should get in touch with other magical girls.

But that was a decision for later, as the night was yet young and the coming hours unpredictable. The five stood side by side on the edge of the rooftops, with darkness far below them, their hands extended as they reached deep into their hearts for their music, their magic. A guitar, a bass, a set of drums, each playing off one another in an aimless melody yet to be discovered. But the fun was always in doing so. A phrase from O-Tae would fill Kasumi with inspiration, her chords then nudging Arisa’s keys in a different direction. Enveloped by light, by delight, they transformed.

Though it was magic that gave light to the elegant fabrics and the wondrous colors, it had been Poppin’ Party, together, that had created their designs, so perfect for them, so full of their own personality in a way that magic could never spontaneously conjure. Their Notes turned to lights that ran down their bodies, dressing them in gentle whites, before further Notes gave them their own colors, adorning them with details in red, purple, pink, yellow, blue.

Then, falling stars the five of them, bright as only a stifling night could make them, they leapt into the fell darkness they braved, their music combined to vanquish the eerie silence where the shadows festered.