July, 10345 UCC

  ***

  The little starship passed a cloudless azure gas giant on its lonely travel.

  Space distorted ever so slightly around the ship’s silver frame, as its Alcubierre drive propelled it forward. Currently it was going at sub lightspeed to allow the woman at the helm to take in the wonders of the galaxy right in front of her.

  She was a beauty – slender and with a small stature, reaching only 149cm in height. Her hair matched the azure of the featureless orb her ship, the Poseidon, was passing in this very moment; it was freely flowing down to her hips. She had a mischievous twinkle in her eyes as she looked from the gas giant to the interior of the ship behind her.

  Who was this beauty, steering a spaceship to an unknown destination?

  You guessed right. She’s me, Felicia.

  I got up from the helm, setting the Poseidon on autopilot to orbit the unknown gas giant for a while longer. It would make for a pretty sight for today, and with the push of a button multiple observation ports opened all across the ship to make the best use of the vista.

  Someone stirred in the guest bunk as the shutters opened. The girl laying there blinked into the reflected light of the gas giant’s dayside.

  “Good morning…” she mumbled.

  The woman lying in my guest bunk was no one else but Tiana, the woman I picked up after following a distress call a couple of weeks ago. I stood in the corridor for a few minutes, just to take in the sight of her – fiery red locks fell down to her shoulders, and her green eyes were a pretty sight to behold. Conflicting feelings arose in me and part of me wanted to turn the ship around, rather than fly deeper into this solar system, where her home planet was located.

  I recalled the planets we visited together this past month. We almost met our end on a planet covered in giant spore spewing fungi, as the cult living there tried to remove our helmets to make us one of them.

  Or the time we visited the nation located entirely on a space station orbiting a black hole. The constant view of the hungering maw that devours even light shaped their cultural development in rather interesting ways – their art was a little bit too depressing for me, though.

  “Are you awake yet, Tiana?”

  I sat down next to her, placing a hand on her shoulder. A strap of her top came loose and the way it was sliding down her arm was rather exciting to me. My eyes kept looking at her skin, a little paler than mine due to her having spent more time in space than me.

  “Just enough.” She yawned and looked out of the window.

  “Ah! That’s Chernoglav!” Naturally she would recognize her own solar system’s planets.

  “Yes. We are in your home system. Which means that today we’ll reach your home and… well, we’ll have to say goodbye.”

  Tiana looked at me with big, sad eyes.

  “Can’t I just keep traveling with you like this instead?”

  I knew this question was coming. But as a Starfarer I couldn’t take someone along with me indefinitely. Familiarity builds attachment and attachment means that one day I will want to stop traveling to enjoy more time together standing still. To settle down.

  And the time I spent with her already made me yearn for it, so I needed to harden my heart if I wanted to see more of the galaxy.

  “I’m sorry, Tiana.”

  She shook her head in response.

  “No, no, it’s alright Felicia. I understand. Attachment between Starfarers and all that.”

  She sat up right next to me and leaned her head against my shoulder.

  “I enjoyed our time together.” She whispered just loud enough for me to hear.

  “Me too.” I replied.

  “I may have fallen in love.” She whispered a bit quieter this time, but I still heard her.

  “Me too.” I replied again, without hesitation.

  “….”

  “….”

  There was an awkward silence between us for a good long while. In a way, it even continued; at least we didn’t exchange words. At first our lips touched, and a moment later our tongues probed each other with clumsy curiosity. Then I lifted up that pesky loose top, and…

  August 2024

  ***

  Seika Hitoishi, a 30-year-old editor for the small Light Novel publisher Magic Collection, or MagiColle for short, sat in a café a short distance away from the office.

  Her brown eyes, underlined by dark rings from a lack of sleep, wandered over the lines of the manuscript she was reading. She flipped the pages with her left hand while her right was absentmindedly twirling a long spoon between its fingers – it was for the untouched parfait that was placed in front of her about twenty minutes ago.

  In the seat on the opposite side of the table sat a young woman, 19 years old, who followed her reading process attentively. Her pen name was Hifumi Ebiko, and it was her manuscript that Seika was reading. She wore a merch shirt of a rock band called ‘Celia in Bondage’ and jeans with no real coordination, like she simply grabbed whatever was clean and comfortable to wear from a closet. Her black hair was tied into a bun behind her head – multiple strands of it were dyed in a teal color, almost making her bun look like a piece of candy. Her grey eyes were fixed on her editor with anticipation as she fidgeted with her hands on her lap.

  Ebiko’s first manuscript for volume 2 was excellent and Seika told her she’d gladly publish it as-is, but nudged her to try and experiment with it, since she was way ahead of the deadline. That was two months ago.

  And so she did. She introduced the completely new character Tiana to the story, having Felicia pick her up in the first chapter.

  Tiana accompanied Felicia in every chapter of the volume, instead of having the main heroine experience everything on her own. This led to a variety of viewpoints, a strong friendship and a blooming romance. And Seika got to see more than just the bloom – in fact this was like a fully opened blooming lily, exposing Seika to its naked pistils, or rather, how said pistils were rubbed against those of another flower.

  “Well, it’s good…” Seika started.

  Ebiko’s eyes grew larger, and sparks of joy were visible in them.

  “…but we’re not printing this with a 1000 word sex scene.”

  Ebiko’s shoulders drooped and she stared at the half-eaten parfait on her end of the table.

  “Oh…”

  “Don’t get me wrong, Ebiko. It’s a good scene. I’m certainly enjoying it – in fact, I wish I was reading this comfortably at home instead of in a café, but it would be too much of a departure from the last volume. Your work will go from unrated to R18 if you go too far with it and we don’t have an R18 imprint.”

  “Why would you need an imprint for that?”

  “For multiple reasons but simplified for your specific case: for separation purposes. No one wants to suddenly get the pornographic harem isekai novel shoved in their face while they’re browsing for something similar to Kino’s Journey, right? If we allow you to write an explicit sex scene like that, your work will need to be categorized appropriately.”

  Ebiko trembled a little – she didn’t seem to be taking it well at all, causing Seika to let out a little sigh. Only after she recruited this girl off a popular web novel platform to publish The Starfaring Maiden she bothered to check the rest of her work.

  It was erotica. So much erotica. Mostly fan fiction, too. Popular female character x female reader, popular female character x popular female character 2, the list of pairings and tags for fetishes would be enough to fill multiple A4 pages. For some of her stories she even commissioned artists to draw pornographic imagery to accompany her words. This girl was through and through a himejoshi, her head full of pairing girls with girls.

  “I was so proud of that scene, too…” Ebiko said with a quiet voice.

  Seika ordered the pages and went over the scene again.

  “You can still imply that sex happens. But no vivid descriptions of body parts going into other body parts. The moment when the artificial gravity of the ship turned off and Felicia fell in love all over again while seeing Tiana with floating hair and the gas giant behind her was really good…”

  She cleared her throat and took off her glasses. In movies and anime, characters did that a lot to make them look more serious when they were delivering some words of wisdom. In her case it only made her author’s face look blurry, so she clumsily put her glasses back on and pretended that this never happened.

  “And I’m going to say this not as your editor now, Ebiko. I’m going to say it as your fan, alright?”

  The girl tilted her head in confusion, but listened.

  “We won’t stop you from posting ‘fan fiction’ of your own work. As long as it doesn’t contain anything that happens in the books directly. You can make your own ‘glopping noise’ chapter.”

  The gears in the young woman’s head visibly turned and she let out a quiet ‘Ohh!’ after Seika’s words.

  Seika nodded as Ebiko seemed to understand.

  “In fact, some authors release scenes like that on fan subscription sites. You may want to look into that. Maybe you can even have AKITO draw the scenario if they have the time.”

  “Will do!”

  Ebiko’s mood improved considerably.

  ***

  After their little exchange they simply enjoyed their parfaits. The café wasn’t that full at this time of day and exuded a more relaxing atmosphere than an oppressively white meeting room, so after a while it became standard practice for MagiColle’s editorial to meet authors in these kinds of places, where they could feel at ease.

  “Hitoishi, do you have a girlfriend?”

  Seika immediately choked on her parfait and knocked her fist against her chest to cough up the half-chewed piece of strawberry that blocked her airways.

  “Excuse me?”

  The young author rested a finger on her lips, her grey eyes inspecting her editor.

  “I just wanted to hear if you have any experience. If you could help me with my scenes.” She added, tapping her other finger on the table.

  “I don’t. And I don’t think telling you about my love life is part of my job description.” Seika coughed again, wiping her mouth with a paper napkin.

  This story has been taken without authorization. Report any sightings.

  “Also, why are you so certain that it would be a girlfriend?”

  Ebiko grinned and leaned closer, her eyes twinkling with mischief. Seika braced herself for whatever kind of teasing she might have to weather.

  “Well, see… when you were reading that scene just now… you tried your best to keep a poker face, but I could see the excitement in those tired eyes.”

  Seika turned her head away from Ebiko.

  “Huh? Is that so? Maybe I was admiring the prose.”

  “Oh, please. I’ve been writing stuff like that since high school. I can read those reactions like an open book by now. You were self-inserting with someone.”

  Was I…?

  “I did see flashes of your imagination. Miori was there.”

  The voice that only Seika could hear came straight out of the gemstone on her earring. She closed her eyes and pinched the bridge of her nose as she suppressed the urge to groan at Minerva’s words.

  I really didn’t need confirmation that you can even see my imagination.

  Her crystal was a mysterious lifeform from another world, given to her by a strange man called Jove who dressed like a wizard. Her name was Minerva, and when Seika’s mind merged with hers, they became one as the Magical Girl Minerva Crimson, a fact she kept secret from everyone in her life.

  Whether they were transformed or not, Minerva was always there to give commentary as a disembodied voice.

  “Hmm, still denying it?” Ebiko leaned back into her seat, looking at Seika with some disappointment. “Either way, you give off a certain vibe.”

  “I’ve been told that before.”

  “Unsurprising!”

  Seika shook her head and finished her parfait.

  “Well, I still have work to do. Send me a mail once you are done reworking that last chapter. If I may offer a word of advice: focus on the emotional more than the physical and it should be alright.”

  Ebiko nodded and packed up her manuscript while Seika paid for them both. They said goodbye to each other with a little wave before they went in opposite directions. Seika let out a sigh.

  “She writes fast, and she writes high quality stuff, but sometimes she can be a handful.”

  “Don’t lie, you’re grateful that you get to read her explicit scenes.”

  “Shut up!”

  Some heads turned Seika’s way as she said those words seemingly unprompted, but she kept walking as if she didn’t notice them.

  Seika leaned forward and let her employee ID dangle from her neck in front of the RFID scanner which locked MagiColle’s doors. A beep and a click later she entered, stretching while letting out a yawn.

  She already felt tired again; it was time for her to grab another energy drink from her desk drawer and get to work scouting for promising talent in the vast expanse of the web.

  As she sat down and opened her can with a noisy hiss, she saw a movement in the corner of her eye. It was Watanabe, the editor in chief of MagiColle.

  “Ah, Hitoishi. Done with Ebiko’s review?”

  “Yep. Had to talk her out of an explicit sex scene.”

  Watanabe let out a laugh.

  “She’s your favorite but still difficult in her own ways, huh? She’s not the only one who likes to skirt the line. Maybe we should launch an imprint for R18 works.”

  “If we do that, she’ll have to start a new series, though. We have already set the tone for The Starfaring Maiden.”

  Watanabe grinned and checked the time on his phone.

  “Actually, can you come with me for this one meeting? I’m thinking of leaving the author I’m meeting in your care, so it would be best if you can meet her as soon as possible.”

  Seika tilted her head.

  “A new author?”

  ***

  Watanabe owned a humble Kei Car, in which Seika currently occupied the passenger seat. He was a father, and if Seika didn’t know it from regularly chatting with him, she would know now, thanks to the booster seat that she spotted in the back.

  “It’s a little drive out. You can read her story on the way there, if you want. I printed it out and put it in the glove box.”

  Seika pulled the box open – and after a few pencils and markers loosely fell into her lap she grabbed inside and pulled out a stack of paper.

  ‘My Friend, the Magical Girl’ was the title of the novel.

  “You’re our resident Magical Girl otaku, so I assume you can give her some pointers when she’s stuck or when she makes egregious mistakes.”

  “Hmm, right.” Seika said with a nod before she dove into the story.

  It was a slice of life story from the point of view of an ordinary girl who befriended a Magical Girl after accidentally seeing her transform on her school’s rooftop.

  Sounds familiar… but I guess that’s the most plausible way to start in a school setting.

  The content was mostly centered on their friendship – if Magical Girl battles were shown they were from the main character’s point of view from afar or over television, or even the internet. The main character, called Yuka, always waited for her dear friend Sora when she was out battling reptilian-like creatures, and the narrative focused on her thoughts and the anxiety of waiting, hoping that her friend was safe.

  In short, it was alternating the sweet slice of life sections, of friendship and sometimes abusing Sora’s Magical Girl powers to have some fun with the real dangers the Magical Girl was facing. It was an interesting approach to witness a Magical Girl’s deeds through the eyes of a normal person who was close to them, almost like tales of soldiers’ wives.

  And speaking of wives, there were hints of a yuri plot line as well, focusing on Yuka feeling fonder and fonder of Sora.

  “She chose quite the peculiar topic to write about. But I like it.”

  “Haha! I still know how to pick them. Anyway, you can tell her yourself in a moment.”

  The car came to a stop and they both got out. They still needed to walk a good distance through a market district to get to their destination – Watanabe’s destination for them was a tempura restaurant.

  “We’re meeting her halfway here; she lives a little bit further out. The place has tables for four that can be isolated by curtains. Only an izakaya would have better privacy for a business meeting.” He seemed quite enthusiastic about this trip.

  “Sometimes I think that you started our company policy to meet authors outside of the office just to sample all the food Tokyo has to offer.” Seika replied with a little smirk.

  “You might be right about that, too!” Watanabe laughed, causing his tired employee to raise her eyebrow.

  ***

  They ordered ginger ale for both of them while waiting for the author. Seika flipped through the script once more and looked at the author’s pen name.

  “Shoko Kohaku” She read aloud. Two of the kanji used in her name seemed as familiar as the premise of her novel, especially the one for ‘Iris’ used in the author’s given name.

  “Something the matter with her name?” Watanabe asked, looking at the manuscript.

  “No, I just have an… odd feeling.” She left it at that – a bell rang at the door and a new customer got greeted by the staff.

  “This might be her.”

  Watanabe and Seika got up from their seats to greet the newcomer. The curtain to their little private space was parted, and Seika’s good mood evaporated to be replaced by immense feelings of guilt.

  Right in front of her was Ayame Takanashi, her best friend for seven years until her memories were stolen by Lethe nine years ago.

  ***

  She was barely recognizable by Seika, who saw her last as a laid-back college student who rarely wore anything other than a green track suit while dyeing her short hair red. Her hair was a natural brown color now, perfectly matching her hazel eyes and easily growing past her shoulders.

  She wore a short sleeve shirt with a plaid pattern and a skirt, carrying her handbag with her as she entered the secluded space.

  “Ah. Good afternoon. I’m Ayame Takanashi, and… you must be Watanabe and you…” she looked at Seika for a little bit longer. There was a dying spark behind her eyes, like the memory of her best friend was still in there and refused to resurface, like a taunt by Lethe herself.

  ‘I always let them have a little bit of it back. It’s so much more satisfying when they have dreams about the things they once knew… and forget about them again in the morning.’

  She had to muster incredible self-control to stop her hands from trembling.

  “…right! Hitoishi. Watanabe let me know that you will be my editor.”

  There was not a hint of recognition in her eyes. Seika shouldn’t have expected anything else.

  All three of them sat down and ordered. Seika buried her face in the menu as if she could avoid Ayame that way – as if she could avert her face from the damage she was responsible for.

  “This is something that interests me, Takanashi. You’re a fashion designer, aren’t you? What made you give writing novels a shot?”

  Watanabe didn’t seem to notice Seika’s aversion to the situation at all and continued the meeting.

  Ayame hesitated for just a moment before she answered.

  “I’m going to therapy for memory loss. For some reason I can barely remember anything past my fourteenth birthday until my final year of college. I do remember the material I learned in school and such, but it’s like I never had a personal life during that time.”

  Seika’s hands trembled again, despite her attempts to control them. She never thought about the implications of all memories of her being erased past the fact that Ayame and her were strangers now – it made sense, though. The two of them were always together. Always causing some trouble, always getting up to something stupid. Ayame was almost never alone during her free time.

  Ayame continued her story.

  “I do have dreams that feel like they are connected to these lost memories, but they never last longer than a few minutes past waking up. And right after waking from my dreams they have already become hazy. So, my therapist suggested that I start writing down whatever I remember when I wake up.”

  Seika froze in place – a cold drop of sweat formed on her forehead and rolled down her nose as she heard those words.

  “I’m certain those dreams are mostly meaningless, definitely just fantasies that I may have entertained myself with. But after I collected enough scraps, I sorted everything I wrote down and turned it into a story. It seemed to be a fun thing to do.”

  “That’s a really interesting approach to writing! If you wanted to figure out a long-term plot that might be an issue, but for a slice of life story it might be valid to base them on whatever your dreams were like.” Watanabe turned his head to Seika.

  “Hitoishi, you’re unusually quiet. Is there anything about this that you don’t like?”

  “Ah? N-no. All of that sounds wonderful.” She said with a forced smile.

  “Actually, uh… excuse me for a moment, please.”

  “Hm, are you not feeling well? You’re sweating.” Watanabe looked at her with some worry.

  “Maybe I ate something bad when I was out with Ebiko… anyway, don’t mind me, do go on!”

  After leaving the curtain she accelerated her steps, almost running towards the bathroom.

  ***

  “Why? Why, why, whywhywhy WHY?!”

  Seika sat in one of the bathroom stalls, her fingernails dug into her scalp as her bloodshot eyes stared at the tiles below.

  She was spiraling. Flashes of Lethe holding Ayame in her vines came back to her mind – vividly at that. Guilt was crushing her heart as she remembered how she immediately gave up – how she partially saw Ayame’s memory loss as a convenient way to shove her away. To keep her safe by cutting all contact. Or so she told herself. In truth, she was simply scared. The way Lethe rummaged through her head – she felt raped. She was afraid of it happening again. She was utterly, thoroughly terrified of Lethe.

  “Why did she start writing? And Watanabe picked her up?!”

  She slammed a fist on the bathroom stall’s wall.

  “Calm down, Seika!”

  “How COULD I calm down?! There’s the living, breathing reminder of what that plant bitch took from me! What I gave up on so quickly without even trying to reconnect! And Watanabe wants me to work with her! A constant reminder of what I failed to protect! And even worse, having her memories of me stolen ruined her life!”

  “I know it looks like that, but she seemed content with it, Seika!”

  “She’s grinning and bearing it while she knows that a huge chunk of her life is missing!”

  She slumped back onto the toilet seat, pulling away some toilet paper to wipe tears from her face.

  “What am I supposed to do now…?”

  “Well, as it so happens, you can go and blow off some steam right now.”

  “What do you mean by that?”

  “I mean that Madame Bille’s marionettes have appeared in a nearby shopping street.”

  Seika took a deep breath and left the toilet stall. There was a small window leading to the back street outside – luckily, her body was rather petite.

  The shopping street was an old and traditional one. The many narrow houses were shops on the ground floor with spaces to live on the floor above – many families have been in these houses living and plying their trade for decades.

  Though instead of the usual bustle the people in this street were running away with panicked screams right now.

  Marionettes, looking similar to the featureless pose figures that artists would be using, were shambling through the streets – their limbs were covered in razor blades while their entire bodies hung on purple glowing strings that stretched into the sky and vanished from sight.

  A man tripped and tried to crawl away from one of the shambling assailants, which raised an arm to hack him to pieces.

  Though before it could do so a crimson blur hit it in the face and launched it away at such a high speed that it shattered as it hit a wall, which in turn cracked. The red object in the meantime came to a standstill, revealing itself to be a person. None other than the Magical Girl Minerva Crimson herself.

  She used the rebound from hitting the marionette in the face with both feet to do a backflip, landing right behind the crawling man and impatiently pulling him on his feet.

  “Don’t get in my way!” She murmured and the civilian took the hint, running out of the combat zone.

  “Thank you for coming, minions of Madame Bille!” She barked as she cracked her knuckles.

  “I’m in a very bad mood today. No cane, no sword, no magic. Just my fists.”

  The alley was filled with the sounds of splintering wood and Minerva’s shouted curses as she tore the attackers limb from limb, snapped their strings and cracked their featureless heads.

  ***

  It took ten minutes for the Flower Brigade to arrive – late yet again, as if Madame Bille herself made sure that they wouldn’t interfere. All they saw was the carnage left behind. Pieces of wood everywhere, razor blades that came loose. Some of the marionette’s leftovers were smeared with blood, as the red Magical Girl kept her promise, even as she cut her own hands on the creatures’ limbs.

  “Are we sure that she’s not part of an evil organization like the Kuma Group kept saying?” asked the Magical Girl in purple.

  ***

  Seika returned to the restaurant. She kept her hands close to her body, hoping nobody would see the dark colorations on her knuckles and fingers. Her Magical Girl form could take extreme punishment, but everything that broke skin would be visible later on as black bruises on her mundane body.

  Needless to say, after cutting up her hands from beating a group of razor-covered Marionettes to death her hands were a right mess.

  She sat down and kept her hands below the tablecloth.

  “Hitoishi, welcome back. I was a little worried. Did you feel sick?”

  Naturally, Watanabe was ever the dutiful boss who was looking out for her well-being, which only made her feel worse about lying about her little breaks all the time.

  She shook her head – after letting off steam like this she managed to calm down significantly – and dared even to face Ayame.

  “I’m alright. So, did you have any plans where you were taking the story, Takanashi? When I read the script, I couldn’t help but notice that there was some romantic tension building between the main characters…”

  ***

  After they said their goodbyes Ayame left in the opposite direction to the two editors. Only now Watanabe turned towards Seika and furrowed his brow. He didn’t say anything at first and only grabbed Seika’s right hand, inspecting the bruises – letting it sink in that he noticed long ago before he spoke.

  “You didn’t have that one when we entered. What’s going on, Hitoishi? What got you so angry that you went and punched a wall?”

  Seika went pale and looked to the side, gritting her teeth.

  “Is something about her getting you that angry?”

  She couldn’t quite place the tone of his voice, but somehow, she was certain that he wasn’t exactly angry with her. More like a concerned father.

  “No, it has nothing to do with her. I have a bad thing going on in my personal life.” She lied. “Please don’t ask.”

  He let go of her hand and let out a long sigh.

  “I can pull you off her novel, if you want. We can have someone else work on it, we don’t necessary need someone who knows their stuff about Magical Girls.”

  Seika shook her head.

  “No. I can do it.”

  Even if she doesn’t remember me, I don’t want to abandon her again.