9. By Myself

“I’m sorry, Uma.”

“You’ve done nothing wrong, Minerva.”

“I’m sorry. I’m such a coward.”

The wind whips through my hair, the green ribbons on my outfit snapping and thrashing against the current. I grit my teeth, holding Veritas tight in the fear that she will leap out of my grasp and return to the fight the moment I give her a chance. Really, though, I should trust her more. She’s my teammate, and she agreed to retreat on my order. I shouldn’t think of her as a liar. She’s not one.

She’s not happy with me, though. I’m not happy with myself.

I panicked. I lost control. And maybe I was right to panic, because that woman was stronger than Fulgora and I don’t even know if she was transformed. I know red magic, I know anger, and the amount of it rolling off of her made it impossible for me to imagine victory. But what good am I, if I can’t face up to impossible odds? That’s what we are. Earth Guardians. The first, last, and only line of defense our world has against every other. I’m one of the oldest and most experienced among all of us, so why am I so weak?

Aurora glances up with a concerned look on her face, already sensitive enough to the fluctuations of magic to get a general read on my mental state. She’s a prodigy, a truly exceptional warrior. I have to protect her, both for her sake and the world’s. She’s going to be so much stronger than me one day, though the thought fills me with as much inadequacy as it does hope. I’m going to get her killed. I’m not fit to be a leader. I shouldn’t have a team at all.

And yet, things have gotten so bad that Uma’tama doesn’t really have any other options.

“You said that if one of the Monster Queens entered the fight, you’d stall them long enough for us to complete the objective,” Veritas accuses.

“Yeah,” I agree. I did say that.

“We almost had it,” Veritas insists.

“Yeah,” I agree again.

“Veritas, leave her alone,” Aurora says gently.

“But she—”

“You both did well,” I say, cutting her off. “Veritas is right. I failed at my role. I panicked, and it prevented us from completing the mission. This was my fault.”

Objectively, I know that just because the red mage is more powerful than I am, that doesn’t mean the engagement was an automatic loss. My goal wasn’t even to defeat her, only to delay her long enough for the other girls to finish their job. But I panicked, just like I did that day. Maybe I should just be thankful everyone is still alive.

“It wasn’t a complete failure,” Uma’tama projects into our ears. “We have learned quite a bit about our enemies today, and we managed to gain enough readings from the fight to be confident that we are at least not caught in the worst-case scenario. That artifact was impressively dangerous, especially given its ability to copy spells, but we are now confident that it poses no existential threat to the stability of your universe, at least not outside the normal risk for artifacts.”

“Well, that’s good!” Aurora says, trying to brighten the mood. “And since the Witches of Darkness have been sticking around our town for so long, I’m sure we’ll get another chance to take them down!”

“Exactly our thoughts!” Uma’tama agrees. “Your targets today have traditionally kept out of the limelight, bringing artifacts to Earth and giving them to humans to cause havoc by proxy. Whether they keep that humanoid artifact or give it away to some criminal, we will have more opportunities to capture it and prevent any more harm.”

“We could have captured it today,” Veritas complains.

“Perhaps, but don’t forget that your team just had to bail you out of getting captured the other day, Veritas. We think you should trust your team more when it comes to judging what is and isn’t a winnable fight. The mindless monsters that emerge from the Dark World must be taken down immediately, so we understand that you are used to fighting hard until victory is achieved. But whatever plan the Corrupted have, it is clearly more long-term than a mindless slaughter of innocents. We cannot rush our engagements against them, lest we rush into a trap.”

“Corrupted?” I ask.

“Yes, well, we heard you all arguing over what to name them on your flight over, so we figured we would share our name for them. As you know, engagements within the Dark World must be kept as brief and infrequent as possible, due to the dangers of the miasma. Your enemies today are why this rule exists.”

“Wait, are you saying that they’re Earth Guardians?” Aurora asks.

“Yes,” Uma’tama answers seriously. “They are former comrades of yours, but they have given up their duty and succumbed to the hatred of the Antipathy. We do not know their objectives, but their hatred for us likely borders on madness. As an Earth Guardian gets older, they become more powerful, but their resistance to the miasma lessens. The Corrupted are a group of four girls whom we have inexcusably failed to protect—Anath, Nanaya, Amalthea, and Melpomene. They are extremely dangerous, possessing all the powers they held as Earth Guardians in addition to whatever dark gifts the lingering will of the Antipathy has granted them.”

“They look like they’re turning into monsters,” Veritas says quietly.

“They do indeed,” Uma’tama agrees. “And perhaps that is exactly what is happening. We fear that one day, that transformation will consume them completely, and there will be nothing left of the human mind they once possessed. We wish to save them, if at all possible, but we do not understand the Dark World well enough to confirm if their condition is reversible.”

“You think they’re going to slowly experience ego death?” I ask, faintly horrified.

“We do not know, but the evidence points that way. The monsters infesting the Dark World did not exist before the great execration, when that universe was still whole. We believe, therefore, that the monsters were the former plants and animals of the Dark World, and perhaps even all that is left of the Antipathy themselves.”

I grimace. I was afraid it would be something like that. No wonder Anath has been getting more and more unhinged every time she comes after me. At least there are only four of them, and if they’re former magical girls then I should at least be able to pull up records of their skills and fighting styles. I can prepare, at least. I don’t know if it will be enough to overcome the power difference, but I have to try.

Even Veritas’ irritation sobers a little after that conversation, and we spend the rest of the flight back to base in silence. The aftermath of a mission is often like this, the exhaustion catching up with us in the moments before we have to somehow return to civilian life. It’s not even lunchtime yet, not that I had the opportunity to eat breakfast. Before I know it, I’ve gone through the motions, walking back out onto the streets of my hometown as my incarnate form sloughs off of me like blood in the shower. Now human again, I have nothing else to do but walk to school.

I remember when I first became an Earth Guardian. It was exciting, in a way, to so often sneak out of class and fight monsters, keeping my secret identity close to my chest as I tried to balance my responsibilities to the world with my responsibilities as an individual. But it wasn’t long before I started drifting away from my friends, unable to give them satisfying explanations for all the promises I couldn’t keep, for all the classes I had to miss, for the times I would come back limping without an injury to make up an excuse for. I don’t even know why I go to school, sometimes. Am I just going to retire like Castalia? I may have gotten accepted to college somehow, but I can’t even imagine it. I’m honestly shocked that I’m going to graduate high school this year. I don’t feel like I’ve earned it, with how my grades barely scrape by, often just a little higher than they probably should be. It’s sort of obvious that I’m one of the local magical girls. Nobody talks to me about it—I wouldn’t tell them anything if they did—but most people in my grade still treat me with that mix of pity and awe that’s just a little too condescending to ignore.

What do my teachers think I’m going to do if they fail me? Are they afraid I’ll blow up their house? Earth Guardians don’t do that. Maybe they just don’t want to be the person holding back the hero who keeps their children alive from graduating. It’s weird to me. Those two things aren’t related. Even if I dropped out of high school, it’s not like I’d stop being an Earth Guardian. School is just the thing I do when there aren’t any monsters to destroy.

By the time I make it to school the cafeteria is open, so I limp my way inside, the compounded injuries from both Minerva and Fulgora aching deeply inside my soul. Aurora is a great healer, but magical healing isn’t quite as magical as I’d like it to be. It works more like a shot of adrenaline, which to an incarnate form can actively, physically repair it for a little while. But incarnate forms are strange, confusing things, as conceptual as they are physical, and for whatever reason they retain our physical human weaknesses when it comes to what we can and cannot walk off.

It’s not like magic can’t physically repair the injuries of the human body, but as far as I know there was only ever one Earth Guardian who managed it, and she is no longer with us.

“Oh! Eliza, hey!”

I glance over and spot Chloe waving at me as I get in the lunch line. I wave back, and after getting my food I limp over to her table and sit down.

“I, uh, noticed you weren’t in class this morning, so I copied my notes for you,” she says, handing me a stack of papers.

“Thanks,” I nod at her, taking them and putting them in my backpack despite knowing that I will never once read them.

“Are you doing okay?” she asks hesitantly. “You were limping a lot.”

I shrug, not really knowing what to say. Chloe is probably the closest thing I have to a friend, but she’s not an Earth Guardian and I just don’t have any idea how to articulate everything that happened to someone who wouldn’t get it. Both of my fights today were on Earth, which means they almost certainly were on the news, and while I doubt Chloe would ever connect me to Minerva, she almost certainly knows that I am Fulgora. She’s known for years, despite the fact that I’ve never told her.

“It looks worse than it is,” I lie. “How are you doing? Things with Brian going okay?”

She groans and starts to regale me with her many relationship troubles. God, she could never be a magical girl. With how much she lets her emotions control her she’d probably blow herself up on the first day. I hum along with her story, giving her amicable nods and appropriate noises of sympathy as I mentally check on the carefully cultivated bundle of anger I keep simmering inside me. My fears float around it, unwanted but still managed by necessity. It churns like an engine, always idling so it can roar up to speed in an instant.

“You’re not really listening, huh?” Chloe calls me out. “Sorry, I talk about myself too much. Do you have any fun plans for the summer?”

I turn to look at her, the anxiety wafting off of her marking her bright smile as fake.

“No, not really,” I tell her.

“Well, we should hang out!” she insists. “I know you have a bit of an unpredictable schedule, but I’m flexible. We could go shopping, or see a movie, or hell, pretend to be older and get drunk if you want!”

That manages to make me snort with amusement.

“I don’t think that last one is a good idea,” I tell her. It would sort of be a public safety risk.

“So… you think the other ones are?” she presses, wiggling her eyebrows at me.

Oh, I see. She’s trying to cheer me up. That’s… really nice, actually.

“I guess if you’re going to twist my arm about it,” I smirk at her. “Sure. You pick the time and place, and then I probably won’t show up.”

“It’s a date!” she declares. “Well, not like a date-date. I think I’m starting to figure out that’s not really your thing.”

I blink.

“Is it not?” I ask, slightly dumbfounded. “I guess I never really thought about it.”

“Yeah, that’s kinda why I don’t think it’s your thing,” she shrugs. “A normal high schooler would be slobbering all over somebody by senior year, but I’ve never seen you check out even the hottest of hotties, and you’ve certainly never complained about being single.”

“I try not to complain much in general,” I tell her.

“I know, sweetie,” she says, patting me on the shoulder. “That’s why you need somebody like me to take care of you.”

I flush a little, looking away with embarrassment.

“I really don’t know why you put up with me,” I admit. I feel like a complete dead fish in our friendship. Chloe is always doing nice stuff for me, but I barely even think about her outside of school. I’m a bad conversationalist and an awful friend; I just kill monsters. It’s the only thing I’m good at.

“Well, somebody ought to,” Chloe shrugs. “And hey, wouldn’t you know it! I’m somebody! So there you go.”

I chuckle, shaking my head. I wonder if I saved her life, or a member of her family. Am I a bad person for not remembering? I want to ask, but even though the divider between my human self and my secret identity is barely more than a shredded curtain, I just can’t bring myself to do it.

“I wonder if that’s why magical girls do it,” Chloe continues, peeking through that curtain anyway. “Somebody has to, so how can you say no when you’re the only one who can?”

I don’t have any idea what to say to that, so I latch onto the first subject change I can think of.

“You really think I’m not interested in dating?” I ask.

“Uh, yeah, why? Is that a surprise to you?”

I mean, I just thought that I couldn’t relate to anyone. It’s kind of hard to get excited about movies and lunch dates and kisses when I’m staggering through the day because I can’t stay asleep through the pain and dreams.

“Y’know, I actually just talked to my brother about this today?” I admit. “My whole life I’ve just taken for granted that I would be gay.”

She snorts her drink out her nose and doubles over into laughter, startling me enough that I would have reflexively cast a shield spell if I was transformed.

Stolen content warning: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.

“Oh my god, Eliza,” she says. “I know you don’t like to talk about it, but that makes it really obvious. You get that, right?”

Yeah. I get that. It’s about the closest I can come to telling her the truth, even though she already knows.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I lie, taking a sip from my drink as I grab a few napkins to hand to her. Her laughing and coughing fit made quite a mess. She accepts them gratefully, wiping down the area in front of her. “You might be onto something about my romantic orientation, though. And maybe my sexual orientation, too? Damn, now I actually have to think about it.”

Maybe that’s why I don’t feel uncomfortable in a child’s body. It would be really fucking awkward to be Minerva if I was actually in a relationship with someone, but I don’t want to be in a relationship in the first place, so I guess that isn’t a big deal? I mean, it’s still extremely weird and kind of creepy, but it’s not like I’m doing it on purpose. It just… started happening one day.

It started happening because I had to say yes.

“Well, apologies for the sudden personal revelation, I suppose,” Chloe says, still chuckling a little. “Or maybe ‘you’re welcome?’ I honestly thought you knew.”

“I mean, the more I think about it, the more I feel like I probably should’ve known,” I admit, scrunching my eyebrows together. “Like just… huh. Yeah. It explains a lot.”

It’s a nice thing to know, assuming it’s true. I kind of want it to be true. It feels like a weight off of my shoulders. I don’t have to worry about finding a relationship that I’ve never really been interested in. It’s not something that’s wrong with me. It’s not the trauma crushing my ability to care about people. It’s not the nightmares, the anger, or the fear. It’s not just another part of me that’s broken.

I really, really want that to be true.

I glide through the rest of the day, school passing me by in flashes so brief and ephemeral that I may as well have not even shown up to class. My mind is too occupied by those corrupted magical girls and the threat they pose. I’m the oldest and most experienced Earth Guardian in the city. It’s my job to keep everyone safe, to stop the monsters before they can hurt anyone innocent. Up until now, Melpomene’s group has always been an enigmatic threat, a group of schemers that I would occasionally find at the end of a long trail, having already escaped before any real fight breaks out. Sometimes Anath would single me out and fight me, and I would kick her ass, and she’d run off. It was infuriating, but it never seemed like she was trying to kill me.