Little Ami watched cartoons in the family room for the better part of the morning. On the floor she curled up with her sheets and pillow, mindlessly munching Wheat Flakes. In the last few minutes of the show, Ami went on her toes, narrowly spilling the last of her cereal. The swarm of mutants banged on the lab's magnetically sealed bulkhead. The heroine was desperately wrestling with the cyro controls. The episode ended with big boy Carbine frozen, "to be continued" subtitled beneath him. The credits rolled down the screen, when a bright glare flashed across the TV. She turned around to see a vertical light in the kitchen window, which had a modest view of the side path to the front door.

The door opened. Donned in her slickest socks, she slid over the hardwood floor to the entryway. She saw her older brother hanging up his odd grey backpack, saying "Now just stay there." With another stride she hugged Dojima around his waist. There was a faint clicking sound, and Dojima made a shush. He addressed the little bugger now strapped to his waist, "Hey, Ami. I didn't wake you when I went out, did I?" Without letting go she shook her head fanning her head full of hair. Dojima hugged her back, and pushed her away, "I'll bet you haven't even had lunch yet." She shook her head again. Dojima went to the kitchen. Ami followed.

Ami sat herself in front of the window facing the family room. On TV the pervious show resumed with a ten second recap, and then played the title sequence to "Space Consumer: The Animated Series." Ami was enthralled with the catchy pop lyrics while Dojima prepared lunch. On space colony 0913, Chris was running through the emergency exits, the red light flashing up and down. Behind her, the terrible mistake of science chased her to the transportation hub. After shutting the third airlock between her and it, she heard the depressurization of the corridor she shut her self from. The pursuer crawled on the ceiling above her. Looking distressed, but determined, the image of Chris grew dark and disappeared for a Commercial Break, leaving Ami just that much more intent to see the harrowing conclusion.

Dojima, having finished hard boiling the eggs, removed the shells and added them to the tuna, mayo, and relish already mixed in his bowl. Ami Turned around to see her older brother making his nasty tuna sandwiches. He knew better than to think this little princess would ever so distasteful to the royal palette. She saw him wisely putting jelly and peanut better on her lunch. Dojima handed Ami the Peanut Butter and Jelly sandwich on a plate, and sat on her right with his own Tuna sandwich. The cartoon returned from its commercials, and Ami watched.

The monster chasing Chris crashed into the corridor before her, and went through the airlocks at that end as well. Trapped between two voids of space, all Chris could to was to prime her blaster for fire.
~~~
That evening Dojima, ever so eager to finish his project, went looking for his backpack. Jax hadn't stayed in place. The disguised robot had disappeared from the entryway, along with his rubbings and photos of the old school. He exhaled from his agape maw, lifting his right eyebrow inquisitive. "First that stupid robot hugs me tighter than a vise," he mused, "Now it's runaway, with all my stuff."

"Oh well," he said making his way upstairs to his room. He passed the bathroom. He could hear his sister chanting the cartoon theme from the morning, then her gargling and spitting mouthwash. Dojima poked his head in. She was wearing her princess pajamas. "Make sure you brush extra hard, you got to get all that peanut butter off your teeth." He opened the mirror cabinet, and removed his toothbrush from the jar Ami had made for her art class. "Like this," he said scraping his incisors.

"Kay," she said in a sing song voice, still in her own cartoon world. When Ami was done brushing Dojima sent her off to bed. "Good night."

"Night, Ami," he went down stairs one last time and turned off all the lights except the one in the Kitchen window. When his father came home he would turn it off. With that done, he went up to his room to start the required paper in his project. MP3 player turned up to focus, Dojima furiously typed on his keyboard vainly producing an essay without any substantial notes. His chair creaked against his back. Relying entirely on memory, the clock on his desktop dragged on, stopping and starting in pace to his half remembered notes. Late into the night, he saved and quit. Wanting only to pass out on his comfy bed, Dojima checked his messages before sleeping.

Marked as read, in his inbox, was the email that sent that crazy robot after him not just a few nights ago. The subject line read, "Hello Dojima, Intelligent Device Jax is Here" Nothing was right about that email, but he had been too intrigued to junk it. Clicking the message, he heard gurgling from within monitor, static from his speakers, and then the plasma in the screen morphed. First spidery legs creped onto his keyboard, eye stalks poked out at him, fumbling into existence, then its whole body grew into being from his computer. Awestruck Dojima pushed away from his desk. He saw mechanical spider's eerie floating silhouette cast by his desk lamb. It sputter an untranslatable message from its printer: \\\Error\\\C, E, F### Drives Sincerely, #*+ writ7ten from my \\\brother's blood machine\\\Recalled for service\\\Error code #@4 corrupted\\\ 4estoration 4equired\\\ from Autekka Support\\\ Announce motto; then initiate urban camo\\\ Motto: Be where they ain't! The robot performed a transformation and became a rather unimpressive grey backpack. It sat on his bed until the morning he took it to school. But when got to school it refused to come off.

Dojima deleted the message from his inbox. A second afterward, a new message arrived, "Training on proper handling of the Jax Rescue and Recovery Unit will begin promptly." The next second Dojima was sitting on hard pavement, staring at a huge red B2. "No, It's eleven at night. We're not doing this." From behind him a howling roar interpreted his rant.
~~~
Completely exhausted from taking care of Ami during the day and training with Jax during the night, Dojima irked out of his bed Sunday morning. He took off his shelf his school's yearbook. Flipping through the pages, he looked for the names of the other mages he had met yesterday, Shimizu and Mitsuko.

Shimizu was slouching. Her Star Brand was biting the palm of her hand and her whole body was hot from the indirect damage of engaging Novaburst's superior star energy attacks.

"Damn, she's a lot tougher than I thought," Shimizu gasped.
Ponpon shifted to grant better cooling. "Her weapon is Viserot, paya. It's like me and all of the Ponbits combined into a single weapon, paya."
Novaburst descended back onto the roof, her posture haughty. "Is that all? Are you really the one who should possess such power?"
"Screw you!" Shimizu yelled through teeth clenched in pain. "I haven't even been a magical girl for two days yet. Cut me some slack, here."
Novaburst shrugged and shook her head. "And is that the same excuse you'll give the enemy as they crush your bones into fragments and slice you apart into bloody meat chunks?"

It was all Shimizu could take of Novaburst's attitude. Ignoring the fact that she was already suffering, Shimizu mentally commanded use of the Boom Burst spell.
"Be careful, paya!" Ponpon advised, but still transformed. It couldn't disobey Shimizu even to protect her against her own pride.
Yelling, Shimizu raised Ponpon to Novaburst and opened fire. Surprised at her opponent's desperation and caught unprepared, Novaburst was knocked back by two out of three discharged Boom Burst spells. Shimizu recoiled, the immense burning pain too much to bear but unable to do anything to numb it. Novaburst rocket dashed forward and knocked Shimizu off of the school building with a brutal hook using Viserot. Shimizu struck a tree and fell to the ground, curled into a ball and still more concerned about the pain from the overheated Star Brand. Blood trickled from the corner of her mouth, her eyes closed tightly and tearing up. Novaburst landed nearby, the suitcase containing the Ponbit in her right hand.
"Not bad, girl." Novaburst commented, but Shimizu wasn't listening. "I didn't actually expect you to hit me."
"Just...just you wait," Shimizu growled, slowly rising into an uneasy sitting position. "You'll find I'm full of surprises."
Novaburst smiled beneath her faceplate. "Well, at least your ego seems fine. Very well, I guess you've earned this."

Novaburst tossed the suitcase to the ground before Shimizu, then turned around. "I'll be waiting for you when you find another Ponbit, girl. Make sure you've grown in power for the next time."
"Wait!" Shimizu called out, but Novaburst had already engaged her rockets and was rapidly leaving the school.
"Mother, I'm unlocking the Ponbit case, paya."
Shimizu struggled to her feet as the case unlocking by itself and opened. Ponpon continued. "Remote activation commensing...done. Ponbit 'Spreiga' registration complete. Master/slave interface link engaged."
Spreiga, as Ponpon called it, booted up and rose out of the protective casing. It was spherical in shape, with eight hexagonal plates in seemingly random orbit around it. It was black, white, and green in color. The Star Brand was now well within Shimizu's pain tolerance, so she was fine. She pointed at Spreiga. "There's nothing wrong with it like there was with you, right?"

"No, paya. Everything is absolutely perfect, paya. Would you like me to teach you how to use Spreiga, Mother?"
"Yes, sure."
Spreiga assumed a position near Shimizu's right flank. "Ahem, Spreiga is a Ponbit that functions by disbersing certain spells into multiple synchronous attacks while amplifying them up to the power of the original spell, paya."
Shimizu blinked. "What does that mean, exactly?"
"It multiplies the attack so it's like you're making multiple attacks at once, paya."
"I see. So, it doesn't cost more energy from my Star Brand?"
"That's correct, paya. Simply fire the spell at Spreiga and it will take care of the rest, paya."
"Okay. And you said it only does certain spells?"
"Ponbits are only good for certain spells, paya. Some spells might only be affected by one Ponbit, some by multiple Ponbits, a few possibly by none at all. Unfortunately, all I know is how to register Ponbits to myself. I won't know how many Ponbits are in total or what they can do to help us until I register them."
"Alrighty. Well, let me see Spreiga in action."
"One more thing, paya. Like your Star Brand, Spreiga too can overheat if relied on too much."
"Oh, is that so? How can I check if it needs to cool down?"
"The status of Ponbits you have are reflected on your All Purpose Scanner when in active status, paya. Don't worry if you try to use a Ponbit's assistance even if it is overheated, paya. Each Ponbit should have safeguards which will reject the command, paya."
"That's a relief. At least I won't have to worry about harming them with my own stupidity. Okay, let's give this a go."

OOC: "I'll be adding a list of new spells created through Spreiga's help in the character profile as soon as possible."

"And that it's for the tutorial, paya. Did you get all of that, Mother?"
Shimizu nodded. "Yeah. Let's just hope I can remember all this under pressure. Now for some food. I'm starving."
Shimizu disbanded and considered where to go eat.

OOC: From now on, I'll put in Underline anything that is in thought, while color-coding all appropriate conversations pieces.
---------------------

The spar went differently from how Mero antipicated. The lad's movements practically responded to Mero instantly, as his eyes practically followed her. Capable of sensing her to a higher degree than before, all he struggled with was generating enough energy and speed to dodge with enough mobility to evade her path. Repeated frenzied dashes and builted up forces of speed were evaded. Although the evasion was clumsy at first, Mern's sense of balance grew to adapt to the sand, and evolved to compensate with additional weight and the jumping he used. Mero scowled lightly, only taking the spar to its intended length all the way, due to her deep rooted sense of obligation, her intended plan shot down with embarressment.

"Shoot... This sparring session was only partly useful. With the sensing bond, this is nothing more than a bull-fighting match."

"Hey, do you think it's possible for the... two of us to combine magic?"
"Oh? What brings this up?"
"Well, the people we were fighting alongside with during that night, I think they were the sort who fought very close together, using attacks together. The two of us may gang attack the same foe, from different directions, but it's really just two attacks..."
"Oh, shush, you're making it sound sappy."
"Sorry."
"So... what you had in mind? I don't really shift-shape or have any other special traits that you can use to "combine forces" as you want." Mero awkwardly tried to use her paws to mimic the quote sign, although poorly.
"Well, both of us can use slashing techniques infused with energy. Any way to combine the two?"
"True... But they usually work by having the attack share the same area, either at a focal point or mixing energy together in some fashion."
"... How about I swing you around by your hind-legs and you..."
"THAT'S SO UTTERLY RETARDED ALREADY!!!" Mero stared at her legs instinctively almost whining from the mental image.

The two of them went home without incident or speaking, more so out of embarressment and energy fatigue than anything else, although Mero still marveled at Mern's general lack of physical fatigue, until she blurted her mind out at dinner, consisting of fish, beans and his favorite dinner snack, Poppers.

"Have you ever done any sort of exercising before?"
"A bit yeah, but mainly running to and from class and some sports the family forced me to join. Otherwise, just a bit of heavy lifting at work and such. Nothing impressive really."
"Well, you did all that training and you're not even bummed out. Heck, you didn't even use the barrier jacket during training."
"Well, I thought the point of the training was to build up on my magic talent without relying on it."
"I did say to work on the basics, although I never said not using the jacket. I approve of it though... but it doesn't explain your unending stamina! You dashed to the beach, climbed and jumped trees while carrying backpacks worth of wet sand, and you did a sparring session! Don't tell me you will then do 1000 push-ups in your sleep! You were pretty much a normal kid yesturday!"
"Well... That did seem weird at first... but it just felt right... kinda like breathing... And whenever, I felt sore or out of shape, if I rubbed my body on that spot and breathed calmly, it felt all better almost instantly."
"Rubbing, hmmm?" She plopped her belly on the table, her face accidently smushed against the fish she was eating out of fatigue, as Mern chuckled out of the sheer hilarity and stupidity.
"Fail!"
"Oh, shut up! I'm really tired and all. I dunno if it'll work at all, but how about a petting or such, using that fatigue-be-gone trick of yours."

Mern shrugged, and finished off the last of his popper, gasping slightly due to the hot gooey cheese center before he applied his hand along her back, contouring to the cat's body shape, grooving slowly and slightly with his fingers, as he focused and slowly started to adjust his breathing, once the novelty and uncertainty of the situation has ebbed. The resulting sensation he felt from Mero felt uplifting and invigorating, much like most of his experience at the beach, and he gradually started to grasp the overall feeling of the magic working through his body and through his fingers into his familiar. Mero purred delightfully, practically having fallen asleep with her face re-smushed in her fish, before his master cleaned her off and put her to rest for the night. Just before he himself went off to sleep, she mumbled absent-mindly.

"Yup, that's magic all right." ^___^

Well... At least I feel like I have a bit of a grasp of how to do this more effectively...

-------------------
*Hours later*

Menarker woke up in the middle of the night, rather unable to sleep. Rather than being tired, the sensation of magic becoming more and more familiar pounded in his mind, practically begging to be used. Opening his window, his pajamas morphed to his barrier jacket, as he leapt from his window down, the bravery present from the tree-jumping training. He absentmindly dashed and wandered the night, finding the old sights new again. The playground equipments were truly child's play, but his mind swelled with a new appreciation as ordinary structures became his plaything. Bold deeds such as climbing up vertical stone walls and telephone poles and leaping from building to building became child's play, each successful attempt emboldening him as barely a sound could be heard, or a tremor felted by his impact. The realization of magic not only as responsibility, but of a sense of freedom and pleasure that he never had before. And it dawned on him, that the training, the new found powers, and the chance encounter with his familiar and the brief time he had, he had come to seek more, despite the concerns, the worries and the danger.

I REALLY LOVE MAGIC!

-------------------------
The next morning, and the night wandering lad could be found having breakfast, having slept for only a few hours more upon coming home.


"So any plans in particular?"
"Just to the park again... Trying to think of anything that'll jog my memory... Something is persistantly on my mind and I can't figure what."
"Guess I'll just tag along then."
"Sure, I guess."
"... By the way..."
"Yes?" Mern looked at the wild cat who was staring at her feet almost as if she was embarressed of wetting the bed.
"Can I have another round of that massage thing?"
"Wait a minute. You said that the massage thing was a magic effect... and I could have sworn you said your familiar magic traits allows you to mimic the effects a few times."
"I used it all up last night."
"...You're a junkie!"
"You're friggin addictive!"
"Oh for heaven's sake, I... wait... addictive, eh? This could be a useful way to get girlfriends..."
"Score one for magic!" She smiled the most exaggarated smile she could muster... "So... can I have another?"
"... Sure..." Mero promptly plopped her chest to the floor, paws sprawled out spread-wing eagle style, as her master pampered her with a look of slight exasperation on his face, but then resigned to the overall cuteness of the situation.

I somehow imagine her abusing that magic and the sensation she felt during the night was transfered over to me by that bond she mentioned. I guess it was amplified for the night, which would make sense since cats are supposed to be nocturnal.

The magical teen then opted his barrier jacket, which was causally stylish enough in his mind to take it to public. Carrying the practically overdosed Mero in his hoodie, he set his designation to the park, with little to no incident. He spied a kitty that strolled along the sidewalk walking the opposite direction past him, with an expression that looked rather delightfully pleased. The sight was a pleasant sensation, an "awwww" moment, but rather pointless to dwell on, so the teenager just left it alone on its merry way, as he entered the park with a purpose of some inspiration.

Then he encountered a familiar face he had not seen since that fateful night.

Mitsuko was feeling a little hesitant. The exercises so far had been hard. There'd been the obvious target practice (Akari had done better), some old fashioned obstacle courses both in and out of the Barrier Jackets to show them the extra options it gave, and other sadistic devisings of the Devices such as standing surrounded by Ceres' drones and learning to dodge when one or more randomly decided to shoot at you.

Even so, she wondered if this was too soon. The Shimizu sisters stood looking at each other, open space between them. They were about to have a sparring match.

The Devices had been adamant. It was almost as if they wanted to beat each other up by proxy.

["For this initial assessment, the purpose is to identify and correct flaws in tactical approach."] Bright Day chimed in conclusion, dragging Mitsuko's attention back to the coming battle.

Something inside Bright Day went clunk. ["Firing lock is released."]

Can't hold back. Mitsuko thought. Akari will never forgive me if I do.

"Good luck!" she tried.

["Begin."]

["Flight of Mercury."]

["Impulse Wings."]

Despite activating her Impulse Wings, Mitsuko charged forward at Akari like a crazy person, trying to cover the distance. Although she'd been busy during the Thursday night fights, from the training she had quite a good idea of just how many silvery missiles Akari could put in the air at once. She'd prefer to avoid that if it all possible.

Akari jumped and the winglike thrusters kicked in, letting her soar into the air. Halting a decent distance in the air, she leveled her bow, a blue string of energy appearing to draw.

["Starry Sky."]

"Uwaa!" Mitsuko shouted, skidding to a halt as arrows passed through the space she was about to fill. She swung Bright Day up defensively, the magical projectiles splintering on the round shield that expanded in front of her.

Akari's glowing arrowstring vanished as she moved to nock it again, the spell expended. Mitsuko's shield flashed out with a crack as she took the last shot on it and then stepped forward, levelling her spear at Akari.

["Celestial Sphere."]

The blazing sphere shot out and... missed as Akari took evasive action, jinking to the side as Mitusko charged again, forcing her to turn and chase her over a longer distance. Forgotten, the Sphere hit the edge of the training barrier and exploded harmlessly.

I can't get close if I keep having to stop to shield and what exactly am I going to do down on the ground here anyway? Mitsuko thought to herself.

Akari laid down another volley with Starry Sky and Mitsuko tried to zig-zag through the arcing shots of the light arrows, getting closer but forced to stop and deflect the last three shots with momentary shields.

Repeating the exact same tactic as last time, she lifted Bright Day fired a Celestial Sphere at Akari. This time, it exploded far too soon in the air beween the dueling sisters, hiding Mitsuko behind a cloud of smoke.

Wisely skirting it, Akari found Mitsuko had vanished.

There came a chime from above and to the side of her.

Standing on the disc of an Aerial Step high above her was Mitsuko, holding Bright Day raised like a wand.

["Orbit Dagger."]

A trio of crimson daggers appeared around Akari, pointed inwards.

"Shoot!"

OOC: Mitsuko just Impulse Rushed up and sideways, seeing she'd either run into Akari coming around that side of the smokecreen (good), or (hopefully) evade notice and get a chance to use her one ranged spell that doesn't need to aim (also good).

Panko's eyes widened in surprise at seeing the guy from the other night. For a moment she thought she should run away, but she didn't know why. There was no way he knew who she was, and he was definitely an ally, right? They'd fought a monster together; he definitely wasn't an enemy, even if he wasn't a friend. For some reason, she wished Picky was with her.

All of that happened in the few seconds before she raised an arm and called to him. "Hey! Menarker, right? Uh, it's me, from the other night." She struggled with what to say. "So, uh, how's your cat doing?"

Menarker heaved a huge sigh and pulled out the practically comatose kitty from his hoodie, jiggling and shaking her body cradled within both his cautious hands, causing her head to bobble up and down while she purred noisy as if she found the ultimate stash of cat-nip, as Mern spoke sarcastically with a wry sort of humor.

"She is doing JUST FINE!"

He smirked as his familiar wiggled her leg slightly and he put her down on the ground, practically watching her stagger like a drunkard for a few seconds before regaining composure, licking her paws and behaving mostly like her normal self, although maintaining her cat-like behavior and silence.

"She was experimenting with my magic. Again. So, uh, I'm glad that you made it safe and sound... I hope everything went well that evening... how exactly did you get your magic? Mine was kinda rushed and hastily put together for the most part... so I came here, hoping something could jog my memory."

Panko reached down to pet the cat. "How'd I get my magic? Well, I mean, a monster attacked me and then Picky told me I had magic powers. So, uh, I guess I just got them or something."

She stood back up. "So, there were those other people there, too, right? Fighting the monster with us? I recogn- I mean, there was a priestess and a weird guy with silver hair and a girl in a black dress. Did you know any of them? We should probably figure out who we all are, right? Since there's those other other people, too." Panko was shuffling her weight from one leg to the other while she said all this. It had been a long time since she had spoken to a classmate who wasn't Erika or Ohno for something other than threatening them. Not that he could tell she was a classmate, but, still, it felt awkward to be nice.

She felt like she was being too quiet. "Anyway, yeah, we should do that. Oh, and why are you wearing your costume? That is your costume, right?"

"Well, if you mean by the magical jacket, this is it in semi-passive mode. It's basically just a change of clothing for when I want to carry Mero inside my hoodie, the lazy cutie. Doesn't really give any magical benefit or use energy, unlike the battle one which I assume you saw previously."

"Me-orw!" ^,^

"Regardless, I don't really recognize any of them to be honest. I don't really pay attention to people's faces much and I tend to have a crappy memory for names. Never done me any good anyway. So I just focus on the things I need doing, although I admit I should probably pay attention a bit more often now."

Mero started nudging herself against his leg.

"So uhh..." He started getting a little nervous, having little else to talk about, when Mero start nudging again with more force. "Not now Mero, I'm trying to think of..."

Mero scowled a little at him and directed her gaze at Panko with an ever slightly warmer expression.

"Wanna duel him? I frankly can't train him the way he is now."
"Hold on, that's not fair. I practically came out unscathed in our spar yesturday. I don't want to injure her for the sake of training."
"You cheated yesturday. Unintentionally and part of that is my fault. She would be a more accurate representation of your current standing... provided she would oblige little ol' me?"

Mero tried her best to look amazingly cute and appealing, even standing on her hind legs, while Mern did a face palm, as if asking the "fates" how did everything spiral out of control.

Akari hesitated as the daggers formed around her, uncertain how she should go about blocking or evading while surrounded.

["Sattelite Expansion, Sentinel Formation."]

Ceres interrupted her indecision, as each of the twelve gunbits detached from her bow by their own volition, rotating less than a foot from their latch points to track each of the projectiles that had appeared. The sky became a string of azure lances as each fired in groups of four at the daggers, blasting them out of the sky with semi-perfect accuracy.

"Losing sight of your target is dangerous, Akari. When this occurs, evade randomly and cycle AESA modes."

["AESA filter switch to Thermal."] The bow chimed again, as Akari's eyepiece lens flickered out of its standard blue tint to assume a reddish hue. She twirled to bring her vision back toward the cloud, glimpsing nothing new with her right eye, though her left could clearly make out Mitsuko. She was charging out of the smoke directly towards her.

"Eyah!" Akari yelped in suprise, frantically interposing Ceres' rather massive form between herself and her sister, causing both devices to connect with a rather impressive ringing sound.

"Execute as we discussed earlier, Akari."

"R-right!" she replies desperately, shoving backward agaisnt the weapon lock and activating her thrusters in an attempt to gain distance. Once she was a body length away and able to aim a point blank shot, she seizes Ceres' bowstring and pulls back a half draw, holding the weapon horizontal. This time however, the string crackled with lightning-like arcs as the arrow formed instantly between the rails as a unstable shaft of wobbling energy.

"Thunderrrrr... EXORCISTT!" Akari yells, snapping the string at her advancing sister.

Mitsuko thrust out a palm, round shield expanding from the center.

["Aggressor Mode."] Bright Day reformatted into a naginata.

"Shield... ERUPTION!" Mitsuko yelled, dragging the blade through her own protective shield just as the lightning arc of the Thunder Exorcist hit.

There was an burst of golden light and crackling lightning, tossing the two girls away from each other with backlash from the two tangled spells.

Mitsuko desperately halted with a thrust from her Impulse Wings, momentarily hovering as Bright Day switched back to a spear. The thin cloud in front of them was dissipating, a blue light visible past it. She shook her head to clear it.

["Let's shoot."] Bright Day chimed, prompting her.

Mitsuko nodded. "Celestial Sphere!"

["Sphere Expansion."]

A crimson casting diagram opened around her, the firing array and containment band appearing beyond the tip of her Device. The scarlet shell of the Sphere formed, containment band orbiting its equator, the firing array feeding power into the barrier shell to create the glowing yellow core that was the explosive charge.

The smoke had parted fully, revealing Akari surrounded by a similar mandala. Energy discharges like feathery wings extended from the arms of her bow and the accelerator rails had slid further apart, a brilliant blue-white ball of energy cupped between them.

Mitsuko gulped. "Shoot!" she shouted, her armoured missile shooting like a cannonball at Akari.