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“Alright, Jeremy! You’ve used your 50/50 to eliminate two of the possible guesses. The options that remain are A)Alchemical Air or B)Alchemical Aether. Which of these Magical Girls was first among their team to provide an interview for *Sleepless Domain*?”
“I can’t believe I let you nerds have the remote.” Steffi said as she slinked from the couch to the ground below. Aniline rolled her eyes while Chandra crouched down to help their girlfriend back to her feet. Steffi resisted though, squirming on the ground and shooting an evil eye at Annie, waiting for a response.
“You said you wanted to watch mindless reality TV to destress.” Steffi then turned her gaze to Techno, seated alone on the nearby loveseat, as Annie continued, trying to wrest control of the conversation. “My bet is on Air, by the way. There was a brief period of time where the group was active before Aether joined, right?” Saying those words caused her to think for a moment. Had Alchemical Aether been in a similar position for a time as Magical Girl Rock Blitz? Were there others who had dealt with even one among the dozens of questions that constantly circled through her mind?
Techno simply gave a curt nod - at least to the question Annie had asked out loud - while Steffi made a big show of picking herself up, twisting her hips and shoulders like a lopsided marionette as she did so. “Mindless reality TV. Mindless! I thought we’d put something on like Big Sister or Daylight Monster Hunters! We just had a big history test! The last thing I want is filling my head with a whole new set of useless facts.”
Before anyone could continue the conversation a shrill buzzing sound came from the TV, followed by the forced chuckle of the host. “Oooh, sorry Jeremy. The correct answer was Alchemical Air. In August of XX14 Alchemical Air spoke with Gloria Steele of Sleepless Domain to announce the fledgling team’s ambition to become known as one of the great all-time Magical Girl Teams. Aether would join a few months later and help lift the team to those imagined heights. Terribly sad about the recent course of events, but I’m sure in some way Alchemical Air got her wish. We here at Trivia Peril won’t forget Team Alchemical anytime soon.”
The studio audience was a roil of reactions between whining “Awwwws,” steady clapping, and the sounds of wrists brushing up against dry faces with fake tears and sniffles. The camera panned out as the show cut to commercial.
“Kinda a macabre topic, huh? Don’ they us'ally stick to trivia about the same six movies that keep getting reboots?” Chandra asked as she held Steffi close, trying in vain to have her girlfriend rest her pink head atop her shoulder.
Steffi though was still in the midst of a minor fit, or at least performing as such. “Ugghhh! I can’t take this. I’ve done enough thinking for the week and I need a break. I’m grabbing a beer from the shop fridge, do you nerds want me to get you something?”
Annie gave a sigh as she tried once again to be the adult in the room. “You know we have to patrol tonight. And you’ve just been reminded of what happened to team Alchemical. Do you really think it’s a good idea to be drinking tonight?”
Steffi puffed up her cheeks and stuck out her tongue in response. “It’s barely 7:00 and I’m just grabbing a hefeweisen. That’s like, barely even a beer. Three hours from now, I’ll be in better fighting form than I am now.”
Aniline sighed as she shook her head and raised her hand slightly in a no, thank you signal, with Techno offering a hand to match.
“Uh, I don’ drink but I dunno if you’ve got anythin' else in tha back fridge? Like, maybe a cranberry soda or a ginger ale or… some’ng? Maybe in the back of the fridge if we look?” Chandra had almost disappeared behind Steffi at this point, with only the bright red edges of her cheek and fingertips still visible. Aniline too felt a heat rise in her cheeks as she looked away sheepishly.
Steffi meanwhile seemed clueless and almost bashful as she tried to set Swing straight. “Ehh, it’s just my dad and I here, so I don’t think there would be any - Oh! - Uh, yeah, I mean, we can look. Might take some time or… something. But who knows, right?”
Compared to the rosy blushes of her two girlfriends, Steffi looked absolutely crimson. She looked to Aniline and opened her mouth as though to say something before biting her lip, grabbing Chandra by the hand and leading her out to Heinrich’s workshop. A second passed and Annie felt her cheeks begin to cool before Steffi’s cry pierced through the chatter of the add break. “Wait!”
She rounded the corner in a pink blur and squeezed behind the loveseat to come to the side of the couch. Aniline looked up at her girlfriend, who somehow looked even redder than before, with sweat streaming down her puffed cheeks. She reached for Steffi’s hand to comfort her, slowly stroking on finger along the back of her hand. Steffi leaned over and pulled the bangs out the way of her girlfriend’s face, planting a peck on her forehead. She once again looked as though she was struggling to spit something out before taking a big gulp of breath and going with the first thing that came to her head.
“Are you sure you don’t want me to get you a beer?”
Aniline grabbed the throw pillow on which she’d been leaning and swatted it at Steffi. The words Just go kiss Chandra already still felt too awkward to say. As though whatever this relationship was they had recently come to was a house of cards and to look at it askance, to speak too loudly or to even blink would cause something to fall.
After Steffi had rounded the corner, Techno reached her hand over to Annie, running her fingers through the girl's hair and pulling down the ruffled threads such that the bangs returned.
“There’s been a lot of change in our group these past few weeks.” She said it with a very matter-of-fact tone, with a smile coming to her face just after. It was an attitude of Techno’s Aniline had grown to respect in a whole new fashion of late. She was the rock in a river, an immovable force steady against all changes and ready to offer her support. There was a sense that Techno knew herself, knew her place in the world even as everyone else shifted that had helped Aniline both anchor herself and lean on that steady support. But it also served as a reflection for all the questions she still had. The questions it seemed everyone had. Seeing all the ways in which Techno was secure in herself, all the answers she seemed to have so often served to remind Annie of all the things she didn’t know, even the things she didn’t think were unknown until her teammate would move or speak with that sense of anchored confidence, purpose and awareness that would send tingles of awe and intimidation running down her spine.
Come to think, was there any more to those feelings? The glances she’d found in herself towards Techno, the way she’d turn to her teammate for assurance, direction or just plain old connection. There was a lot she found admirable, striking, even beautiful in the periwinkle-haired Magical Girl.
Aniline took a gulp of air and tried to compose herself. Or course, as though on instinct, her head turned towards Techno for that same assurance and grounding that had just been running through her mind, only to make the problem all the worse! But was there really a problem? To question these feelings? To look inside for something more? After all, Steffi seemed to have no problem holding two people in her heart. So many of her preconceptions had all been so thoroughly shaken in the last while. Was it really so weird to think that she may have another thing to learn about herself, that she could feel that same way about multiple people without betraying anyone? That those feelings for Techno may include…
“Aniline?”
The girl turned to her, a slight quizzical tilt to her head. Even in this moment as she was without an answer she still projected so much confidence.
“Sorry, just… sometimes all the things that have happened - all those changes - they just kind of hit like crashing waves, all at once.” There was a degree to which she was lying by omission but it wasn’t wholly untrue.
Techno reached over and grabbed Aniline’s hand in her own, standing up in the process and walking with that slow, methodical strut from the loveseat to the couch, taking a cross-legged seat in between where Steffi and Chandra had been cuddled, turning to face Aniline.
“Is there anything you want to talk about?”
Oh this just wasn’t FAIR!
“I guess it just feels…” Well, no sense in avoiding it. Techno had already helped her through a lot. Of course, she was terrified of talking about where her mind had most recently wandered, but there were still plenty of questions that could benefit from that grounding the girl offered. “Honestly it feels like I don’t know what I’m doing. With anything, really. Girl stuff, Magical Girl stuff, school stuff, dating stuff, and now whatever this new wrinkle adds to all that! And despite that, everything seems to be working out! You, Steffi, Chandra, my parents, teachers, you’ve all been great! It’s like I’m in a raft out on the river and there are all these holes and gashes in it. And there’s a little bit of water at my ankles and I’m waiting for it to rise, waiting for that other shoe to drop. There’s a little part of my brain that can’t keep screaming from within that if that were to happen, things would start making sense.”
She felt tears welling up in her eyes now, and she felt Techno’s grip on her hands tighten, followed by the same stroking motion of the fingers along the back of the hand she had to Steffi moments ago.
“All that time I spent avoiding the truth, all that time I spent catastrophizing, those times I kept myself from asking questions because I was afraid of the answers I would get, there has to be some validity to that, right? Otherwise, what was the point? Were those nights of longing, numbness and pain just something I could have decided to not have?”
Her throat closed up and she felt the waterworks come on. She couldn’t see well through the tears and her attempts to fight them back but she soon felt Techno wrap her arms around her in a hug. It was comforting, sturdy as she leaned into the frame of the girl who sat in silence.
Eventually, the tears stopped. At least, the big, ugly globules of tears stopped. She still felt against her hot cheeks the chill of a cold stream of tiny tears run down from the edges of her eyes. Techno broke the hug and looked to her with a heavy expression.
“Aniline. It’s alright. What you’re describing is pain and trauma. There’s not necessarily a point to trauma, sometimes it just is.”
Well damn. Short and to the point, as she should have expected from Techno. The word “Trauma” was still hard to wrap her head around. That’s a word used to describe someone who suffered a monster attack, or who saw a loved one die in front of them. Surely those nights of simply thinking didn’t count, right?
She took a moment to steel herself, to try to absorb Techno’s words. It would be a process to really come to accept that, to process those years stuck between knowing and unknowing as trauma, but there was an undeniable truth to those words, despite her brain’s stubborn protests. Just another hole in the raft, she supposed.
“Have you talked with Steffi about this? Do you think this recent change to your relationship may have exacerbated some of those fears? Or that it may have been just one more thing to take on in so short a period of time?” It struck Annie that there was a slowness to the way Techno expressed these thoughts, as though she were trying very carefully to word this in a particular way. There was something she found terribly funny about that trepidation and she couldn’t help but to laugh and give a snort before answering.
“I’d be lying if I said it wasn’t another thing to wrap my head around, but for the most part, it’s been amazing! Steffi can be a lot, she can be a goddamn tornado with how much energy she brings to any moment, all the different ways she’ll throw you, how much she asks you be on your feet and be ready to change and keep up. And that’s great! I love all that about her. But it’s also really demanding to keep up with that, exhausting even. So when she told me that she wanted to date Chandra, I couldn't help but to acknowledge a part of me was deeply relieved. That I would have some time to charge my batteries as she foisted that energy onto someone else. But when we go on those adventures, when I allow myself to be caught up in the moment, I can feel my own little tornado starting to grow within. And again, I like that! I don’t know if I would be Magical Girl Rock Blitz if I hadn’t picked up on some of that fearlessness, that desire to pursue the things you want doggedly. But when you’re rebuilding so much of what you thought you knew about yourself, it can be intimidating to feel that pace accelerate and to fear a loss of control over what foundation you’re establishing.”
There were no tears this time, just the panting of her own breath. Even just to talk about all these emotions and questions, to loose that tap just a little, was exhausting. Techno though seemed unfazed, the same observant and warm expression as which Annie had become accustomed through all their talks.
“Aniline. I can’t speak from the same experience. But I think perhaps it might help to establish some control over that foundation. You talk about these fears as though their validation will make sense. Well, what are some of the good things that make sense? What’s the foundation that you want to build upon?”
She took a moment to think. It was a bit of a perspective shift. So much of her life, Aniline defined herself as the smart one. Things came naturally to her, the world made a sort of intuitive sense. Navigating what was right, what was wrong, true or false, it was like a puzzle and for so long she thought she’d been happy with the life she’d lived having taken that approach. Part of what was so terrifying was that perspective shift, in giving up that sense of orientation through intellect and to instead make choices about what was right and what was real.
But… it had all worked out so far, right? It was frequently terrifying, disorienting, and she would often run up against a wall of powerful emotions with an intensity she had never felt before. But some of those intense emotions included things like actualization, comfort, joy. It was as though she had removed a heavy jacket that had numbed her to so much of herself. She had already made such a leap in listening to that voice inside of her, in coming to her own answers (albeit with some magical prodding,) maybe there were other ways she could be happy, new emotions to which she might otherwise be numb? Maybe all it took was that intentionality?
“I guess… in terms of the things I like, the things that make sense… I like Steffi. I really like Steffi. I didn’t know if she liked me, or if she would like me, but she does! And it’s been a ride but she’s always been there for me. I’ve liked our dates, our dinners, the way she calls me her ‘girlfriend.’ I’m somebody’s girlfriend. I have a girlfriend! And even with the Magical Girl stuff, she’s rubbed my own past behaviour in my face enough times, but she’s put more time and effort into my training than I’ve ever seen her put into her own. It’s made me feel like we’re actually part of a team. That I’m not just tagging along to keep her out of trouble but that we’re actually doing a good thing, that we’re saving people. That’s… good!”
She took a moment to chuckle, to let herself feel that happiness, the smile expanding on her face before she continued. Techno looked as though she was about to say something perhaps inject with an You’ve always been part of the team, Aniline before stopping herself. It was funny, just moments ago she’d felt intimidated by Techno’s calm confidence, how she always seemed to know what to say or to do, but this was the most she had ever seen the girl hesitate.
The chuckles having subsided and her mind racing to other positive thoughts, she continued. “And there’s also Chandra. When Steffi told me she had kissed Chandra, that she wanted to talk about opening up our relationship, I was hurt. I was wondering if I wasn’t enough for her, if I wasn’t pretty, that all my worrying and all my figuring stuff out and my fears were just too much of a downer for her to deal with. But we got to talking. And she told me how much she likes me, and all the things she sees in me that are unique. And she did the same for Chandra. And more than the differences it was the similarities that struck me. The way she would twirl her finger around Chandra’s cheek as she called her cute, the placement of her hands as she would bring her in for a kiss, the energy to their banter in battle. That’s all the same things she does to me! She twirls her finger along my cheek the same way, she places the one hand between the area of the small of the back and the hip as she uses her palm to pull me in, she talks the same smack to me as we’re fighting. It’s…”
Annie was blushing redder than she’d ever thought her face could be. Her back had curled in on itself and she’d only just realized that Techno had let go of her hands so Annie could rub them together furtively, as though nervous to share a secret.
“She thinks I’m cute.”
She felt like such a dork to say it out loud. How many times did Steffi have to say that to Annie only for it to really mean anything to her when she said it to Chandra? It was as though there was a certain genuine quality to those words - the way they came out of Steffi’s mouth - that she couldn’t appreciate firsthand. She probably just thinks I’m cute “on the inside” her dumb brain would tell her. But although Aniline didn’t feel that way about Chandra, it was pretty undeniable that Magical Girl Swing Blitz was the dictionary definition of cute. So hearing the same excitement, seeing the nervousness and glee as Steffi would say those things to Chandra, it helped her recognize how much the same was there between their own interactions.
A warm pressure and the grip of long familiar fingers around her shoulder shocked her out from her inward gaze. She looked up from her hands to see that Techno was leaning over towards her, meeting the shorter Aniline eye-to-eye as she pushed gently against her right shoulder to have the girl meet her gaze.
“Annie. You’re plenty cute.” She said.
Time seemed to shatter around her. Four simple words had stirred her heart to pump and throb while the heat rising through her face hearkened to a harsh summer’s day. Was this real? She gazed into her heart for answers. Her feelings for Techno weren’t quite the same as her feelings for Steffi. That same electricity wasn’t there, they didn’t have that same bond that had been built, split, and changed over the years. And while she no doubt found Techno to be beautiful and alluring, to find the way she moved to be so captivating it was such a different emotion. They were very much like the genres from which they took their Magical Girl names. Being with Steffi made her want to jump atop her bed, sing into a hair brush microphone and laugh before collapsing one next to the other. Being with Techno made her want to sit down, to focus on her senses and to parse the choices and the movements of an artist expressed through an unknown, experiential language. There was a certain academic, removed quality to that fascination. It didn’t quite feel like a crush.
But then, who’s to say that all crushes feel the same? She’d had some fleeting feelings for girls in the past, daydreamed of them at times. But Steffi was the first and only girl for whom she gave any such feelings any nurturing or attention. And for all the similarities in the ways Steffi had expressed her affection for both she and Chandra, there were also many differences. If Steffi could feel those multiple forms of love and affection and if each was different, then maybe these feelings Annie had - this loss of composure and this desire to drift from the world beyond and be lost in Techno’s presence - perhaps they were a form of love as well?
The thought passed through her mind to that rainy night she and Steffi had spent. She felt a longing for how easy things had seemed in that moment, how much sense it had made to lean in and kiss her. She wanted so much to do the same, to plant a kiss on Techno’s lips and leave things to the fate that had been so kind to her of late. But theirs was a relationship so built on that communication, that talking to one another. It would only feel right if she said something.
She looked into Techno’s eyes and prepared to speak, prepared to let something out. Instead, all there was was stammering breaths. Kissing her would be so much easier.
“Ithinkyou’recuteaswell.” The words came out in a whisper. Techno cocked her head to the side, not quite sure what to make of the rushed and nervous word-spittle.
“Techno, I think you’re cute and pretty and smart and I like talking to you. And I think this recent change to my relationship with Steffi, with her dating Chandra as well, it’s made me realize that these feelings can take different forms. And so much of our friendship lately has involved talking about all kinds of complicated emotional stuff. So I figured… why not talk about one more thing that’s been weighing on my mind?”
She was just about to melt into the goddamn couch cushions. Oh Founder, what if this screws everything up? Techno had been so supportive and kind throughout all these recent changes. Was she about to gamble all of that away?
Techno stood from the couch and paced for a while before turning to respond. “Aniline. I’m really flattered, truly. And as I said, I think you’re cute as well, stunning even! And like yourself I’ve very much enjoyed our conversations and our deepening relationship of late.”
The But… that hung in the air was so palpable that Techno didn’t even have to vocalize it.
“When I look at the relationship you have with Steffi, the relationships she has each with you and Chandra, I see a certain spark. A fascination and a compulsion to act certain ways, to escalate certain behaviours, to be physical…” For all the blushing that had gone around the team tonight, this was the first Aniline had seen those familiar red highlights grace Techno’s face. Somewhat unexpectedly, the other girl ceased her pacing back and forth to take back her seat beside Aniline, scrunching herself closer on the couch as thigh brushed against thigh.
“There’s still a lot about myself I don’t know. A lot of questions I avoid because I don’t want a firm answer. It’s part of what I’ve found to be so great and inspiring in these talks we’ve shared, Annie. That you’re so committed to taking those leaps of faith and putting those questions to the test. I’ve tried to emulate that myself in my own small ways.”
A beat passed before Techno turned around and planted a kiss on Annie’s lips. She was startled, confused, still in the process of melting. She had only just begun to kiss back, to lose herself in the moment before Techno broke away. She opened her eyes and she felt the waves of hot breath from Techno roll down her chin. In many ways, it mirrored the kisses she had shared with Steffi. The heat, the instinct, the loss of the world around her. But there was also something missing. A certain spark, a passion, an urge to take in every last drop of that frozen moment and to let some other part of herself take control.
She looked to Techno and saw that same recognition on her face. It was one she had become familiar with in the mirror, in those moments where bit by bit her doubts about who she was would crumble. In the eyes, there was a glimmer of recognition, a spark of knowing. But along the edges of the mouth, the lip turned up and the edges at a sharp crease, there was a word forming within, repeating in the back of her head. Damn.
“Hey.” Annie said, taking one of Techno’s hands into her own. “You’re already one step closer to joy. Real joy.”
“I know.” She said, her voice dipping from her typical flat sing-songy tone to a true monotone.
Before Aniline could say anything she felt the movement of periwinkle hair as Techno nuzzled her head into the crook between her shoulder and her neck. “I like having a goal, a purpose. I long knew that I would be a Magical Girl, given all those that have been a part of my family. And for so long I thought about that as my purpose. Not necessarily to save lives or do the right thing or live up to any heroic ideals. To just get a good grade in being a Magical Girl, I guess.” Aniline felt more of the other girl’s weight as she leaned into her frame, prompting the blonde girl to tip her body into the corner of the couch’s back and armrest.
“Being driven, having a goal, its helped me do things I’m proud of. I’m happy with my tenure as a Magical Girl and I’m happy to be a part of Team Blitz. In fact, you were all there for me, offering me a spot on your team shortly after I had left my sister to forge my own path. Those few nights in between, where I was alone, where I was discovering my powers in new ways, they were absolutely terrifying. And then you came along, offered me a place and a purpose once again, as part of Team Blitz. I was discovering myself, stretching myself, learning about myself and the brilliant people that had come into my life. I had a new set of goals to guide me. But having those goals, taking so much on my plate, it's made it all the trivial to bottle things up inside. It's been easy to wake up in the morning, to have those answers and those tasks and to work towards them, all while having good reasons not to ask those difficult questions.” A forlorn look came to Techno’s eye as she reached one hand upwards, towards the ceiling’s light fixture. A familiar phrase soon followed. “Maybe it’s not supposed to be easy.”
They lay there for a few moments on the couch. One hand of Aniline’s reached around to embrace the other girl while with the other she slowly traced her fingers through that long periwinkle hair, letting the strands flow through and fall as she reached the end. For all that talk and communication had been such a defining part of their relationship, these few moments of silence were perhaps the closest Annie had ever felt with Techno.
She reflected on how she had felt earlier, her heart beating as she watched the dancer-like motions and unshakable confidence of the other girl. Perhaps there was an unanswerable quality to it all. Did those feelings really count as a crush? Was this an aspect of her being caught in Steffi’s tornado? Was a part of her disappointed? Each of these questions seemed so far away, as though they belonged in a different reality altogether. All she knew was that this moment here - as she and Techno cuddled, embracing a moment of shared uncertainty - it all made sense. She wasn’t quite sure what sense it made or what exactly this meant for the two of them. She had never really cuddled up with a friend before, well, at least not until after she and Steffi were already dating. But as with the kiss before, she felt the pull to let this moment be the whole of her world. But unlike that moment and unlike the many kisses she had shared with Steffi there was no wondering what came next. No question as to where things would go between them, if things would escalate. Just the sense it made to have Techno as a friend. Someone she could speak to about anything at all, someone she could turn to for grace and confidence, someone who had already leant her so much help, someone who seemed to always know what to say, and someone with whom she could cuddle and share some form of physical affection.
“Uh, hey, robot girl! You’re getting pretty comfortable with my girlfriend there, aren’chu?” The two turned to see that Steffi had returned, with Chandra in tow. A light rosy gloss hung under her eyes and it was hard to tell how much of it had come from a sincere emotion - be it embarrassment or anger - versus the beer.
While Aniline stammered for the right words, Techno righted herself on the couch and turned to speak with Steffi. “Oh, yes, we were just cuddling. This was after I had kissed her, actually. We’d be happy to talk more about it if you like. Although I might suggest that Chandra first address the shirt she’s put on backwards.”
A familiar beet-red complexion once again adorned the face of everyone on Team Blitz aside from Techno. Aniline almost spit out a laugh for how much sense it all seemed to make once again. This was indeed the truth she had found, the foundation that brought her so much joy and seemed to anchor so much of the world. Distracting herself from Chandra’s fix to her wardrobe she looked at her watch. 19:24.
Oh yes, It was going to be a long night. For all the truth this moment spoke to her, between the blushing faces and the loss of words, she found herself wishing she had taken up Steffi’s offer for a beer.