Chapter Text
Lights on?
This place has… power?
Nadia was puzzled. Ghosts seldom came this far, yet intuition told her that she was on the right track.
These islands had teemed with people centuries back. Nature had quickly reclaimed the land mankind had once ruled; buildings that had once stood proud like glittering glass castles were now little more than hollowed husks covered in overgrowth, trees and branches sprouting through their beams.
So finding a place that not only was relatively intact but that also had power was not just an anomaly, but a clear sign of habitation.
The Ghost turned every which way. She had not spotted signs of any of the many antagonistic species that had arrived on Earth to lay claim to the cradle of humanity.
The militaristic Cabal would not settle on seismically active lands without extensively engineering the landscape to mitigate the impact of a quake.
The Hive were equally unsubtle, immediately tainting the lands around their underground lairs with their blasphemous magics, but their fetid stench could be picked up miles away and there was not a hint of that.
The Vex held no interest in these territories either; had that been the case, the enigmatic machines would have made their presence known immediately by warping the land and the ruins into structures useful for their simulations.
The Fallen were the most likely ones to stake a claim to those abandoned islands, and Nadia had spotted signs of their camps elsewhere, but not here.
The last ones on her checklist were the most abhorrent of them all; but like the Hive, the presence of the Taken could also be felt from a huge distance and Nadia was not detecting them either.
The only thing she had detected was the power keeping this heavy armored door sealed shut.
But that lock could not be that much of a challenge for her, right? Back in the Farm, all the way back near the EDZ, no door could keep her out–
Huh?
It–won't open?
Now that was weird.
Alright, let's take a closer look at this thing.
It took Nadia half an hour to get a grasp of what she was trying to unlock. It was no normal lock. Someone had… repurposed Vex tech? And married it with Hive runes? How?
Just who made this thing–
*click*
Something metallic pressed against Nadia's shell.
“Sono doa kara hanarete.”
The Ghost froze.
“Don't hurt me…”
The female voice was cool. And pitiless.
“Ugokidasu.”
The Ghost needed a second to fetch the language suite. That was an ancient tongue that had mostly been spoken on those islands.
“Okay,” Nadia answered in the same language. “Please don't shoot.”
The Ghost floated away from the door slowly – and turned around with the same painstaking caution.
A girl? She did not look older than fifteen years.
But her outfit was unlike anything she had ever seen. Not the ragtag armor of a scavenger or survivalist, but a…
A dress?
And a rather austere one at that, mostly white with purple and black accents.
“I'm sorry,” Nadia apologized. “I didn't mean to break into your home.”
The gun on the girl's hand looked ancient, but… pristine. As if it had been lovingly maintained instead of left to rust on some shelf.
And the girl's grip on it was perfectly steady.
Nadia then realized she should have felt her clearly a minute before, but it had been like the girl had come into existence just before putting the gun to her shell.
“Please don't hurt me.”
Her captor appraised her dispassionately. Her purple eyes were glazed, almost lifeless.
“You're a Ghost.”
Some of Nadia's fear went away. “Yes.”
“What did you want with my home?”
Intuition both warned Nadia and told her to answer: “You.”
There was no reaction in her captor’s face. “Why?”
The Ghost thought her answer carefully. “I don't know your story,” she admitted, “but I feel you need someone to lean on.”
Her captor stared at her for some interminable seconds.
Then she put her gun away–behind the strange round device attached to her left arm. Some kind of shield? Nadia was at once interested. “I’ve never seen that kind of thing.”
The girl did not acknowledge her observation. “Why me? I'm not dead.”
“Well, you're not… not wholly alive either.”
A mild hint of irritation flashed on the girl's face. “Not asking for permission to scan is rude.”
“Sorry,” Nadia hurriedly apologized. “You're right, but I don't–I mean–I didn't really need a deep scan to notice it. You're breathing, you have a pulse, but your soul…” She ‘blinked’, or more properly, she did what Ghosts do instead of blinking. “I can't see it.”
The girl’s face lost that sole hint of emotion. “I had expected you could.”
Nadia turned slightly to each side, as a person would do when shaking their head. “No, I don't.” Then, after a beat: “I've never found someone alive but without a soul.” On a hunch she added: “What happened to you?”
The girl shoved Nadia aside and stood in front of the blast door. It slid downwards at once.
“I made a contract,” she answered quietly.
Nadia tilted slightly sideways. “Huh?”
“Doesn't matter now. They're long gone.” The girl walked into the exposed passageway. Nadia followed–
–or tried to. At once red lights turned on and a pale white bubble of tightly woven white light encased the Ghost. She needed a moment to recognize what had just happened: “What–? You've just–detained me?”
“It's automated,” the girl answered curtly. “What do you want with my home?”
Again Nadia ‘shook her head’. “Nothing,” she repeated. “It's you I'm interested in.”
Nadia recognized the canisters at once. “That's Fallen ether.”
Her host grunted in acknowledgment.
“You trade with them?”
“That's how they pay me.”
The Ghost was puzzled. “Pay you? Why?” That earned her a cold look. “Sorry–it's just that–”
“Fallen don't trade with humans?”
Awkwardly Nadia ‘nodded in agreement’. “Never heard of that.”
The girl went back to her work. On a table lay three weapons in different stages of disassembly and cleaning. She picked up one of them, a simple sidearm. “They tried to kill me at first,” she said quietly. “When they saw they couldn't, they left me alone. Then they noticed I was killing Hive near one of their camps, so they offered to pay me for that.”
Nadia was surprised. “I've never heard of humans working with the Fallen before.” Her ‘host’ said nothing to that, so the Ghost added, “How do you use ether?”
The girl said nothing to that either. She continued cleaning the pistol instead.
Nadia hovered over her left shoulder. Then she switched to the other side, and finally she floated in front of her.
“I'm not going to tell anyone,” she promised.
A slight glare. “And I should tell you because of that?”
“No, but–” Nadia was briefly flustered. “I can't help you if you don't let me get to know you.”
The girl did not stop working.
Her answer came after a few seconds. “I don't need help.”
The Ghost kept her focus on the girl.
“But you do.”
A second glare. More intense now. “You're overstaying your welcome.”
The Ghost hovered in closer. “When was the last time you spoke with someone? Not for business. Just as friends.”
The girl continued work on the pistol. Without answering.
Nadia waited.
The girl did not speak.
The Ghost waited.
Her host continued working without a word.
Nadia did not move.
Then, finally, the girl's hands stopped moving.
“You didn't exist then.”
The Ghost did the equivalent of a double take. “But that was…”
A curt nod. “Before the Collapse.”
“You’ve been alive since then?” Nadia was apoplectic. “All that long?”
There was no reply now. Instead, she went back to work on the gun.
“But how…? How have you remained alive all this time?”
“That doesn’t concern you.” She expertly finished reassembling the weapon, then held it and shook it slightly.
The Ghost examined the gun. “It’s the first time I see a Beretta outside a database.”
A grim nod. “It works.”
Nadia kept her focus on the pistol. “I don’t doubt it does, but it shouldn’t be hard for you to get your hands on much better equipment.”
Laconically the girl gestured at a closet. Curiously, Nadia inspected it – and was surprised to find a small arsenal in there. She turned towards her ‘host’. “Why aren’t you using any of this?”
The girl glared at the Ghost. “You don’t need to know.” Irritation again appeared on her features. “You will keep asking questions no matter what, right?”
There was a smile in Nadia’s voice now. “I’m trying to get you to open up.”
“I don’t need that to survive here. If that’s all you want, get out.”
The Ghost thought she saw a sliver of an opening there. She looked for long seconds into the girl’s eyes before asking: “What do you do here other than surviving?”
The purple eyes held her look in silence.
Then their owner looked away.
“I’m waiting.”
Nadia moved to again float in front of her eyes.
“Maybe that wait is over.”
The girl arched an eyebrow. “And what would you know?”
The Ghost hovered away and looked at the room. It was ascetic in its cleanliness. The sole concession to comfort was the bed, but otherwise it was part workshop, part storehouse, with crates stacked and a scrupulously tidy workbench where not a single screw was out of place.
On a corner, a simple notebook had been framed in glass and hung on the wall. ‘Campus Note’ was etched on the cover.
Nadia scanned this notebook closely. “You wanted to protect someone, but you couldn’t.”
Anger blazed on the girl’s eyes. She gripped the pistol tightly. “Get out.”
The Ghost kept her attention on the notebook for a moment. Then turned to face her host. “Tell me about her.”
Tears gathered in the corners of the girl’s eyes. “ Yamero. ”
Nadia floated over to her host and maneuvered to put herself directly in front of the barrel of her pistol.
“Please.”
The girl did not show any reaction to that. But tears still spilled down her cheeks.
“You want to know, fine.” She reached behind the shield contraption on her arm, and placed an egg-shaped gem on the table. It was deep amethyst in color, almost black, with occasional wisps of light dancing inside.
Nadia focused on it at once–
“By the Traveler!”
There was fury in the girl’s eyes now, but her voice was still monotone. “This is what your questions are doing to me.”
The Ghost scanned the gem for long seconds, then turned to face her host again. “And this is why I was drawn to you.” Then she glowed brightly for a second, and the girl had to shield herself–
And when the radiance faded away, the girl blinked a few times, took a breath, then looked at Nadia in surprise: “What did you just do? ”
Then the girl noticed the gem on the table.
It was resplendent, brightly aglow.
The girl hiccupped, then collapsed over the workbench bawling loudly.
Nadia hovered next to her. “It’s okay,” she whispered. “You don’t have to carry this burden alone anymore.”
That only made it worse. “That is what she would have said!” she sobbed.
The Ghost ‘nodded’. “I know,” she said. “She isn’t here to tell you this. But I am. And I won’t leave you.”
The fighter streaked through the sky as the sun timidly peeked over the horizon. It was black as night on top and glowing white underneath, swirling eldritch energies coursing through its frame, and left no exhaust in its wake. Its shape was equally intimidating, the sharp and aggressive lines of many knives poised for the strike.
Everyone in the Last City and beyond knew that craft and what it represented. The Thousand Wings was the personal fighter of the first Guardian to be anointed an Iron Lord after Rasputin had almost annihilated them all – the Young Wolf themself.
“We are approaching the islands of Japan,” their Ghost informed. “Kyushu should be within sight in less than a minute.”
The Guardian looked to their side. The sea below them was a carpet of indigo, turning into a splash of crimson and bright gold where it met the rising sun. “Other than Fallen and Wrathborn, what do we have around here?”
“Not much. Some time ago the Cabal used to be active in Hokkaido and the Kuril archipelago. Ikora had the Hidden investigate it – apparently they were surveying for mineral resources, and didn’t find anything they wanted. There’s also rumors that Taken have been sighted here, but nothing concrete.”
The Young Wolf reviewed the files on their target location. Sector Mita-9 had been once part of the sprawling urbanizations surrounding Tokyo. It had been nothing special – a residential area with malls, shops, schools, and extensive public transportation systems. All of that was a crumbling ruin now; time and erosion had brought down what multiple earthquakes had failed to destroy.
They raced quickly across Kyushu, and crossed the narrow strait to enter Honshu itself next. “ETA to our target is 6 minutes now.”
“Roger.” A last check on their loadout. The gauntlets of their armor were perpetually shedding a noxious green miasma, their touch corrosive and poisoning. Pairing those tenebrous grips with the similarly dread-inspiring revolver (‘hand cannon’) that had once been the signature weapon of the feared Dredgen Yor was only second nature. A scout rifle and a heavy linear fusion rifle were the other pieces, and they ought to do well against their likely enemy.
Flashes of light and blue tracers sparked from their objective. Ghost noted this: “Guardian, LZ is hot!”
“I can see that,” they grunted. “Drop me by the rear of the Wrathborn.”
“Copy that!”
Not a second had passed after Ghost had teleported the Guardian to the ground when the first Wrathborn Hive exploded in a cloud of poison with a shrill scream. This alerted the others to the new threat – only for them to recoil in panic when they realized exactly what the danger was.
The Fallen were not used to Guardians fighting for them and trained their sights on the new arrival, but their weapons stayed silent as they saw the Young Wolf cut a swath through their besiegers. The Hive were significant in number, and with plenty of firepower at their disposal, but they could not even hope to compete with the Lightbearer that had felled the Taken King himself. It was not long before they broke and fled in a chaotic retreat.
The Young Wolf could have given pursuit, but their objective there was to protect these Eliksni at Misraaks’s request, so they let them go. In the lull that followed, they surveyed the carnage around them. First they noted some corpses atop the terrace of a derelict building overlooking the Fallen camp and jumped there, ignoring the wary looks of the many snipers taking aim at them. “Hey Ghost,” they called, “check this out.”
At once Ghost materialized and scanned the bodies. Several wizards and one of the hulking monstrosities popularly dubbed ‘Ogres’ lay dead there. “Whatever killed them, it was not Fallen weaponry. And they were exquisitely accurate.”
“Not only that.” The Young Wolf turned around. Behind them, there was a hallway and a few passageways leading to crumbling stairs and the floors below. “Their killer snuck up on them and shot them literally point-blank from behind.” They inspected the corpse of the Ogre. There was a single bullet hole on the rear of its cranium, but no exit wound.
Ghost looked closely. “It’s very hard to inflict this kind of damage with just one shot.”
The Guardian legend looked around themselves warily. They felt observed, but their watcher was crafty and had concealed themselves well. “Stay out of sight,” they ordered their Ghost. “Now let’s talk to these Fallen.”
The Eliksni were afraid. Nothing good could come out of a direct visit by the most feared champion of the Great Machine. As such, they kept their weapons trained on them, but as the Young Wolf approached their camp facing the sun with their own guns holstered, they held their fire.
The Guardian stopped fifteen paces away from the battered defensive line where the Fallen had held the Hive at bay. “I bring word from Misraakskel of House Light,” they said in flawless Eliksni. “You are welcome to join them in the Last City. He can offer shelter, supplies, and a place to build a new home.”
The Fallen warriors exchanged looks. Then one of them stood forward, lean, wiry and young-looking. “I am Sivraakis, acolyte of the Daughter of the Sky,” she introduced herself. “Why should we believe you? Your hands are thick with Eliksni blood, why should we take your offer?”
The Young Wolf gestured with an open hand behind them. “You could have fought off those Wrathborn, but you would have lost many. I just saved their lives, and you know it. Why would I have done that if I hadn’t come with a peace offer? Besides, I’m sure you know other Eliksni groups around are joining Misraakskel.”
That earned them some uneasy nods. Sivraakis herself had to concede that. “You speak truly on both counts. But it’s not easy to accept. We all have lost people at the hands of the Vanguard and others like you.”
A sigh, and the Young Wolf shook their head. “That’s what many in the Last City say. Stories of what happened as you laid siege to the City have been told over and over and over. You want to stay, fine, we won’t drag you there. But we might not come again to pull you out of the mess.”
Sivraakis wanted to say that they did not need the help, but that was not true and she knew it. She resigned herself and bowed her head. “We don’t have much time to consider it, don’t we?”
“Misraakskel is sending skiffs here to assist with the evacuation as we speak. You can think about it, just not for too long.” The Young Wolf turned on their heel. “I want to investigate the surroundings. Can I at least hope you won’t fire upon us?”
The Eliksni lieutenant tried to conceal her irritation. “You’ve earned that much. But we can’t defuse mines and tripwires for you. Just watch your step.”
“Nothing I’m not used to.” The Young Wolf retraced their steps and jumped back on top of the building that the Hive leaders had used as a command post of sorts. “Let’s see if we can find this assassin.”
“It’s not an Eliksni,” Ghost cut in. “I can say that much. Eliksni can’t use Void Light.”
“A Guardian.”
“Probably. But I have never seen this kind of signature before.”
“Explain.”
“I have to patch into your armor. Hold on a second.” After a few moments, the heads-up display on the Young Wolf’s helmet shifted to a different visible spectrum. There were traces of Void Light alright, but as Ghost said, it was the first time they saw clear traces like lines, connecting together the silhouettes of human shapes as they had crouched into position to fire single rifle rounds or approached now-dead Hive to literally execute them at point-blank range.
“This is… fast,” the Young Wolf said in surprise.
“Not just fast,” Ghost agreed. “You can’t achieve this kind of speed through motion alone. Someone here is manipulating the space-time continuum.”
The Guardian blinked. “That’s right up there with Vex stuff.”
“But this isn’t Vex, Guardian. This is Light use alright. Ikora herself would be impressed. No one that I know can use the Light to stop time.”
“Osiris would have given a kingdom for being able to do that…” The Young Wolf studied one of the silhouettes. “And whoever she is, she’s a prodigy. I mean, it looks like a young girl, right?”
“She does. We have enough of a trail to try and find her. Let’s go.”
The trail, though, was erratic. It was not continuous; it seemed to break at random intervals, then to reappear in completely unexpected locations, all to the north and west of the Eliksni camp.
“Guardian, there is another Ghost nearby.”
“You know them?”
A ‘nod’. “Her name is Nadia. Last I had heard she was unbonded, but now she’s not.”
“Can you pinpoint her location?”
“Maybe. I can feel her presence on-again and off-again.”
The Young Wolf looked around. They were on a courtyard of sorts, right next to the ruins of what once had been a school. Still they could not see anyone, but there were hundreds of places from which someone could spy on them without being seen in turn.
“Come out,” they called out. “We’d like a word.”
Homura had been watching indeed. Nadia had had to talk her into assisting Sivraakis and her people. Being seven hundred years old made her ancient despite her absurdly youthful looks, and hunting reality warping horrors that hid in invisible mazes was so much more of a challenge than slaughtering Hive that it would not be unfair to call this event boring.
Except that these were the Eliksni that had hired her in a way after witnessing how much of a scarily efficient killer she was.
They were the first living beings in centuries she had felt some kind of attachment to. Her Ghost had highlighted this: “They’re something you care for, in a way.”
Homura had tried to dismiss this. “They just pay me.”
Nadia had ‘blinked’. “Customers can become amiable, turn into friends even. You wouldn’t want your friends hurt.”
Making that association had been a mistake. “For the good that did,” the Puella Magi/Guardian had muttered bitterly.
“Not everything you do is bound to turn out bad.”
“Not thinking of those things was how I managed to stay sane all this time.”
“But now you can. And I’ll patch you up,” Nadia had insisted. “I told you, you don’t have to carry your burdens alone anymore.”
Homura had felt like wanting to snap then, but she had repressed herself for so long to avoid witching out that even lashing out was a muted response in her case. “Stop it. I let entire multiverses go. Your mind can’t fit what I gave up.”
Nadia’s gaze had remained steady. “And you are going to give up on more still?”
The Puella Magi/Guardian had wanted to say ‘yes’ out of spite, but that was stupid, and trying not to be stupid had been one of the few lifelines left for anchoring what had remained of her soul and mind.
So she had grabbed her gear and raced out of her hideout.
During the fight itself, she had tried to stay out of view. She did not want others getting insights into her capabilities. Kyubey had dealt her a harsh blow upon figuring out what she could do and how she had used it – and what the consequences had been. So the less others knew about her, the better.
But now another Guardian had come looking for her. Nadia knew who that was, and it unsettled her. This was not just another Lightbearer, but a legend of this time.
Nadia whispered in her mind: “We should go and meet them.”
Homura nodded, despite not liking it. Then she made up her mind. Her self-imposed isolation had lasted enough.
So she said out loud in Japanese, “I’m coming out.”
She stepped out of her hideout inside the ruins of the school and walked forward to meet the Young Wolf.
They regarded her with curiosity. “Hello. Nice to meet a new Light. Your name is…?”
“Mafuyu. Nice to meet you too.”
The Young Wolf’s Ghost materialized next to their Guardian. “Hello. We figured you helped the Eliksni back in the square and wanted to meet you.”
This did not sit well with Homura. If they had figured out that then she had left a trail for them to follow. That was the kind of mistake she had tried not to make. “What do you know?”
Her fellow Guardian smiled. “Enough to tell Ikora and Osiris back in the Tower would absolutely love to hear from you.”
Nadia spoke then. “Ikora and Osiris are some of the best experts when it comes to using the Light.”
‘Mafuyu’ was mistrustful. “And you suggest I should go and meet them.”
“If you want,” the Young Wolf said politely, noticing her wariness. “It’s not an order. But all Guardians eventually gather there. You would meet others like you.”
I doubt that, Homura thought. But then another thought occurred to her. Would it be possible that other former Puella Magi could have become ‘Guardians’?
“I would go,” she said. “But I don’t have a ship.”
The Young Wolf smiled again. “You can hitch a ride with us,” they offered. “Or we could let you borrow one of ours.”
It was hard to refuse that kind of earnestness. “I’d be grateful to borrow a ship,” she said with a thankful nod. “But I can’t pilot.”
The Ghost next to her fellow Guardian spoke up. “You don’t need to worry about it. Nadia will take care of that for you.”
Homura would have been taken aback at that, if she had not been warned by Nadia that Ghosts could often feel each other’s presence. She half-bowed in typical Japanese fashion. “Then I’ll be happy to accept your help.”
“Glad to help a fellow Guardian,” the Young Wolf said brightly. “Mind if I ask how old are you?”
‘Mafuyu’ knew by now that most new Lights had scant recollections of their previous lives at best. She was also aware that she had neither the skills nor the experience to be a good liar.
But she wanted to keep her secrets. “I was fourteen.”
The Ghost noted her outfit. “You’re still wearing your clothes from your old life. How long have you been a Guardian?”
‘Mafuyu’ shook her head. “It hasn’t been long.”
The Young Wolf was also studying her. “I’m curious about the device on your arm. I’ve never seen anything like it.”
Homura realized that she was cornered and she could not bluff her way through this without raising suspicions. “That’s personal. I would like to keep it that way.” Too late her gut told her that was blunt, so she added with a bow of her head: “Please.”
That was revealing in and of itself. The Young Wolf intuited something, but decided to respect her wish for privacy. “I understand,” they said. “All in good time. We’ll leave a ship to take you to the Tower. If there’s anything you want to know, ask away.”
Names and faces she had long kept buried blazed through her mind and she tried to stop herself – without success.
Nadia noted this. Many would be prime candidates for Guardianship, she whispered in her mind.
“I had friends,” ‘Mafuyu’ said warily. “Like me. You would recognize them.”
Again a friendly smile appeared on the Young Wolf’s face. “I doubt that,” they said. “If it’s friends you recall from your previous life, there’s a chance some of them could be Guardians now. But I haven’t met Lightbearers of your age.”
Homura could only nod at that. “I expected as much.” She looked around the place. Her mind wandered back towards the past but she rigidly reasserted control and refocused. “I need to stay a little longer. Get my gear and say some goodbyes.”
“Of course,” the Young Wolf replied. “We’ll stay by Sivraakis’ camp until the skiffs arrive. See you at the Tower if you don’t return before then. I’d tell you to be careful,” they added with a grin, “but I get the feeling it’s the Wrathborn that need to be careful around you. Yoroshiku onegaishimasu, Mafuyu-san. ”
Again Homura bowed politely to the Guardian, then she turned around and walked away.
After a while she reached a part of the ruins that she had disciplined herself into not visiting.
Because walking those streets was tantamount to stabbing herself all over.
She could recall everything at will. How they had looked all those years past. The shop here, the pachinko parlor there, the hairdresser across the street, and the Korean restaurant around the corner. Each and every detail.
The shopping mall where she had encountered Madoka and Sayaka.
The alleyway where Sayaka had fought Kyoko.
The bridge where Sayaka and Kyoko had almost clashed for a second time.
The courtyard where Walpurgisnacht had pinned her to the ground after hurling a building at her.
Where she had last seen Madoka before she had wished her way into godhood.
Tears rolled down Homura’s cheeks.
Leaving Japan felt to her like a final admission of defeat.
Why couldn’t I do better?
Why couldn’t I find the way out?
Why couldn’t I save her?
Nadia floated next to her. “You can do everything right and still fail,” the Ghost whispered gently.
The pain was excruciating. For a few seconds she stood alone on some crossroads, not far from the apartment building where Tomoe Mami had once lived, weeping silently.
“There were wishes that Kyubey could not grant,” she sniffled. “I wished to protect her, but I couldn’t. Then I kept on fighting in the world she tried to save. But I couldn’t save it either.” Again she sniffled. “Why didn’t I witch out just then?”
Nadia shone a warm, soft golden light on her face. “You protected her long enough for her to achieve her destiny. And the world did not die. Look around!” The city was in ruins, but greenery covered it all over. Birds sang and whistled past her. The rising sun was a caress on her skin, a slight breeze carrying a slightly salty sea tang.
Homura was not persuaded. “I only have two keepsakes to remember her by.”
The Ghost focused on the red string Homura used to keep her hair in place. “You could have turned back time again instead of letting things get this far.”
“It was pointless.” She had no more tears to shed, but she was not any less in pain. “There was nothing left to try by going back, no way other than forward.” She sat on the cracked pavement. “And it’s been seven hundred years since then.”
“But not even a week since you met me.”
Homura turned her head around to look at Nadia with glazed eyes. “To try and convince me that you’re derived from her is a cheap shot.”
Again Nadia glowed softly – only this time with a gentle pink radiance. “All is one in the Light,” she whispered. “You don’t know it yet, but Guardians have tenets. Devotion, bravery, sacrifice, death.” The Ghost waited for a beat to let that sink in. “She is the first Guardian.”
Then abruptly Nadia snapped sideways, instantly on alert. “And not the last.”
Homura was about to ask what it was, then she also felt it. Light coalescing somewhere close.
She got on her feet and started walking, Nadia by her shoulder. They entered Mami’s building, then traversed the crumbling pitch-black hallways to eventually exit into the inner courtyard. It was thick with overgrowth and trees, and rusting beams and concrete where part of the building had collapsed.
And, on a small clearing, a blonde girl knelt in stupor. A Ghost floating next to her.
The golden eyes noticed Homura and turned to look at her.
“What… who are you?” Then the girl looked at her own hands. “Who am I?”