Sweet Bear, Rise Up!

When Miho finally stopped binging on candy, the sun had nearly set. The counter and floor were littered with wrappers and plastic. Fuku and Sayuri were both shocked at just how much Miho had consumed – and how fierce she’d been at cutting them off when they’d tried to steal a piece.

Miho wiped off her face with a wet napkin, taking off all the chocolate she’d smeared around her lips. “It’s like a wave of joy in my mouth,” she moaned.

Her joy was cut short by a clanging in the air ducts, as something banged its way through until crashing out through one of the vents.

Out came Kuma-chan, tumbling out and flying past everyone as he tried to stabilize himself. “There we are! Fuku, couldn’t you have stuffed me in a bag or something? My wings are killing me! I – ” He froze, falling on Sayuri’s shoulder as he saw the display of chocolate carnage laid out before him. “…Did I miss something?”

Sayuri held up what remained of the jade bands Miho had been wearing.

“Whoa!” Kuma-chan’s eyes bulged at the sight. “So you’re back! The Sweet Bear’s come out of hibernation!” He pumped his tiny little bear fist into the air. “Awesome! And just in the nick of time!”

Everyone looked at Kuma-chan, expecting him to elaborate. Only to grow angry when his statement stood on its own.

“Oh. Um. You all haven’t looked outside, have you. Don’t do it now. I saw a bunch of people skulking around the area when I flew in.”

Fuku sighed. “I guess a trillion yen’s enough to override a lot of people’s survival instinct.”

“A TRILLION?!” Kuma-chan gasped. “No wonder there were so many!”

Miho looked back to the master bedroom where she’d left Hideo. “Sayuri. Fuku. I need you to get Hideo to safety.”

The two looked at each other but didn’t object. When they came out of the bedroom, each had one of Hideo’s arms slung around their shoulders, the Yasuda patriarch loudly snoring as he’s helped out of the room.

He’d been so distraught by the day’s events that he’d refused to rest. Miho had needed to cast a spell to force him to sleep, to reset his body. In hindsight that seemed a bad idea.

Miho snapped her fingers. Every appliance in the kitchen slid and shifted away from where the oven had been, where a green magic circle was revealed.

Sayuri blinked. “A teleportation spell? How long has that been there?”

“Since I bought the place,” grinned Miho. “It’ll take you to the sewers under the house. Keep walking forward; go up the second manhole you see. And if anyone was dumb enough to go down there to tunnel in…” She left that threat unfinished.

The two slowly dragged Hideo with them towards the circle, Fuku turning to look at Miho one last time before he stepped in. “You sure you’ll be ok?”

“Of course.” The head of a familiar staff slid out of Miho’s sleeve, its pink orb pulsing with new energy as it landed in her hand for the first time in years. As the rest of the staff started to extend out, she admitted, “I’ve got some shit to work through.”

-----

The front door flew off its hinges. Three Jade Chrysanthemum goons made their way inside, each holding a serrated knife. They’d already checked the garage, seeing the Wolf Blazer for a brief moment before it rocketed away.

The three made their way up the stairs and started to sweep the second floor. Slowly, they cleared through what looked like a young girl’s bedroom filled with stuffed animals and merchandise from old shows. There was an empty spot in the pile of animals on her bed, almost like one was missing.

But as they climbed the stairs to the third floor, it became harder to move. The floor was sticky. The one in front grunted as a soft slurping filled the air. He looked down and saw something a clear, dark yellow substance coating the stairs. Who the hell’d spilled all this honey?

Miho appeared at the top of the stairs, holding her staff and pointing it down towards the goons. A brilliant pink light shone from its tip, and the last thing the goons felt before they lost consciousness was a beam of magic slamming into their faces.

----

From the street, dozens could see the flash of pink light escape from the windows of the Yasuda residence. An eclectic mix of Jade Chrysanthemum hangers-on and kaijin ne’er do wells watched the light fade, eyes locked on the exposed entrance. None dared to be the next to enter.

One kaijin, a humanoid wearing a military helmet and having cannons instead of forearms, spat out a half-smoked cigar. “Screw this,” he shouted. The cannons raised into the air, shooting a volley high into the air.

“They said a trillion for ‘em dead. Didn’t say the body had to be in good condition.”

The air began to wail as a dozen bomb reached the apex of their trajectory and began their descent, bearing down on the house.

With only seconds before the bombs landed, there was a shout from inside and a bright flash of pink.

“SWEET BEAR POWER! RISE UP!”

The house evaporated in a ball of fire and debris, raining down over the entire block. An entire three-story building was gone in an instant. No one could have survived that.

No one should have survived that.

But as the dust slowly cleared, a pink glow lingered in the dark of the night. There was a woman there covered in pure energy, two eyes glaring out as pieces of magic armor began to materialize on her form. Two pink wrist bands, blue shoes, a pair of bear’s ears popping out from the head. A flowing white and blue dress snapped into being as two furred gloves slipped onto her hands, exposing freshly sharpened claws.

The field vanished when her staff tapped the ground, revealing the very alive Magical Girl Sweet Bear standing amidst the ruins of a place she’d worked ten years to make into a loving home.

-----

Consider the female grizzly bear.

Weighing over eight hundred pounds in muscle, armed with claws that can shred bulletproof armor, and with a bite that can go through steel, one would be forgiven for thinking they are godless killing machines. But unlike their arctic cousins, they do not go out of their way to be a threat to humans or others.

That changes the instant it thinks its cubs are involved.

Almost nine in ten attacks from a grizzly are from a mother defending her cub. About seven in ten deaths are from the same.

Yasuda Miho had always held back in her time as Sweet Bear – her opponents were usually victims themselves. But these sons of bitches?

She would rain down hell upon them.