Meeting the Resistance

A part of Mamoru wished meeting his favorite idol would have ended with her asking to join her in some other way, preferably in holy matrimony, but he was happy to gain more allies against Suba. Yuto seemed capable enough in a fight, more so than Yamiko at least, and whatever Mirai was could prove to be useful with any technology. It was likely that some reservations against agreeing so quickly were diminished by the invite coming from the perfect blue hair idol, but even as the high school boy realized that he decided he didn’t care.

You are ridiculous. Hikari didn’t seem amused, her voice even sounded like it came with a sigh. At least she is significantly less witch-like than the witch, but still-.

“Like, hold on,” Yamiko added, “we just met you people and still don’t really know what your deal is.” The purple haired girl slid close to Mamoru and grabbed his arm. “Right Bae?”

Ugh. I suppose I agree with the witch.

“We can at least count them allies, considering they saved our lives.” Mamoru felt at where his side had been blasted open, “but it won’t hurt to ask how you intend to take on Subarashii?”

Yuto nodded. He smiled and left the room without a word. Mirai crossed her holographic looking arms and nodded. She walked off her current screen onto the monitor next to Mamoru.

“Are you familiar with the legend of the Mage Marin?”

Mamoru knew the tales, the so-called great enchantress who lived long before even when Hikari would have been alive. She was said to hold the secrets to magic and vanished from public life taking many of them with her. In his youth, Mamoru thought it a simple fairy tale to explain how magic had declined since the end of the High Era to their current age. It was, after all, rather convenient to blame decreasing potency in maryoku on some great mage running off to buy milk and never returning.

The red-haired boy explained as much to Mirai, though she probably knew as the asker of the question, and added, “What does myth have to do with anything anyway?”

Yamiko shook her head.

“Yikes, like you can’t be a mage and think Marlin is a myth, you know.”

“Fu fu, she is right. That myth is in fact what we believe the key to finding out how to defeat Subarashii.”

“Even if she was out there somewhere, how do you expect to find her?”

Mirai vanished from the monitor and Mamoru’s phone lit up with the sapphire-haired girl.

“We aren’t searching without good reason; Toshio found a document a couple of years ago in Suba’s archive detailing the shrines that were setup after Marlin left. For some reason it was locked behind so much security, you wouldn’t believe.”

“Who?” Mamoru asked. Mirai made an expression that said ‘ah’ without vocalizing the sound.

“Perhaps I should introduce you to the rest of our crew.” She turned around on the phone’s screen and pointed out the door. “This way!”

Yamiko shrugged, and the ghostly image of Hikari did along with her. Mamoru obliqued, standing up and heading out the door. The “base,” if it could even be called that, was very small and nothing to write home about. They had no trouble weaving through and finding a small living space with a coach and television. Two strangers sat playing a video game, the first was a tall, lanky fellow with jet black hair and oval face. Next to him was a considerably shorter girl with dyed silver hair—black roots were showing—and a round face. She was clearly losing the game by the look on her face, but the man suddenly jumped up and shouted.

“Yeah! That’s three wins in a row! You owe me a week’s worth of candy bars!”

“I would have won if you weren’t screen peaking!” she replied while puffing her cheeks.

Despite their attitudes, they were obviously older than Mamoru and Yamiko by at least ten years.

Behind the gaming duo that was beginning to squabble sat a table with a man in a top hat and suit, and next to him was a brown bear. The man sipped a cup he held like it was fancy tea and rolled his eyes. The fancy man turned to the bear.

“They ruin the mood, don’t they Oogata-San?”

The bear rolled on its side and began to scratch an itch with its hindleg.

“I should have known you weren’t much better company.” It wasn’t until the man was sipping again that he turned to see Mamoru and Yamiko walk in. He paused a moment, then took a couple more sips before shouting to the gaming duo. “Hondas! We have guests!”

Immediately the duo stopped and straightened up and a large ‘PAUSE’ appeared on the screen. Mirai laughed.

“It’s good everyone else is here. Mamoru, Yamiko, meet the rest of the resistance. Our two alpha gamers,”

“Please don’t call us that,” the woman butted in.

“Are Toshio Honda and Kaori Honda. Toshio is who I mentioned found the document at Suba. The man over in the corner is Mitsuo, and our furry friend is Oogata-San.

“A pleasure,” the well-dressed Mitsuo said before taking another sip of his tea.

Toshio charged forward and grabbed Mamoru’s hand to shake it. He did the same to Yamiko, and she wiped her hands on her clothes after getting free.

“A pleasure to meet you both! Yuto told me about the fight you had with the Middle Manager, it sounds like it was epic! I wish I had those kinds of balls-“

“Toshio, language around kids please,” Kaori said.

“Ah, sorry, well, anyway I am happy to see you are doing alright. Looks like Mirai’s healing magic did the trick!”

Mitsuo grumbled something into his cup before taking another sip.

Mamoru blinked a couple of times.

“You saved me?”

“Fu fu, I guess I didn’t mention, but healing magic happens to be my specialty.” She puffed out her chest in a show of confidence.

“Oh please,” the tea sipping man muttered into his cup.

Mirai disappeared from Mamoru’s phone and appeared on the game’s pause screen.

“Toshio, I was explaining to them about what you found about Marlin, and thought you might better explain it.”

The man straightened up. He nodded and gave a cheerful grin to the other Honda, she rolled her eyes in response.

“Well, I was once employed by Subarashii, not a decision I am proud of, I must say.”

“I for one tried to dissuade him when he said he was taking employment there,” Kaori added.

“But you both buckled at the sight of the salary, please carry on with your story about the magic woman while we are all still young,” Mitsuo said between tea sips.

“I would be able to if you all didn’t keep interrupting me! Anyway, I was an engineer for the company, which sounds like it should have been a glamorous position, but I was nothing more than a grunt—maybe no better than a trained monkey. To say I got disappointed after a while… would be underselling it. So, I did what any bored person with too much technical training would do and started playing around with some of the systems we had.”

“I, like don’t think that’s what anyone would do,” Yamiko whispered mostly to herself, but audible enough that Mamoru found himself agreeing.