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 Posted: Sat Jul 05, 2025 5:35 pm
Quote: The Fireflies (6) : In the warm summer nights, little glowing lights begin to bob and dart through the city. Fireflies are mating, so this isn't uncommon in itself; in the past few days you've probably seen hundreds of fireflies. What makes these lights so unique is that they seem to change color; you might see a blue one, a green one, a red one. They flicker randomly, and something just seems off with them. If you come into contact with one, you will find yourself with a strange electric jolt. They cannot be caught, and will flicker away if you pursue too aggressively. This isn't the first time they've appeared in Destiny City, but no one's been able to tell where they came from or where they're going. No matter how quickly you chase them, they always seem to disappear before you can find any answers.
Shaking her head, she got up off her bed, lifted her henshin pen aloft, and said, “Aquitania Power, Make-Up!” Like ribbons of light, her fuku formed around her. Twirling around in appreciation for how she felt in it, she hurried down the stairs and out the door. “Bye, Khaz, be back in a bit!”
“Be safe! I’ll have my phone on me if you need me!” he called back before the front door slammed.
Aquitania hummed as she practically skipped down the streets toward a park she could cut through into the wider city. The moon was waxing gibbous tonight, just a few days past half full, or, as it was properly known, the first quarter. Which felt silly on a visual level, but really only made sense from a timekeeping perspective. It was still bright enough to outshine some of the lesser stars around it on its trajectory through space.
However, as she made her way through the park, she paused as she saw a flicker of light. Blinking, the chibi senshi paused before making her way over towards the flicker of light.
There it was again! It blinked from a greenish yellow to a bright fuschia. And another, this time winking from cyan to greenish yellow, dancing around the fuschia.
Aquitania halted in surprise. Fireflies? But color-shifting? What…? More fireflies flew into view, blinking through a neon rainbow of colors, so dizzying that it took her some time to realize she wasn’t the only one observing the light show.
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Posted: Sun Jul 06, 2025 7:26 pm
Blarney had actually just been considering powering down, after a fairly light-and-easy sort of patrol. But in true form, he’d been distracted by the pretty lights. It wasn’t his first time seeing it, not by a longshot, but they were still beautiful - he loved the fireflies. He couldn’t believe that other places in the world only had one color! How dull was that?
So he was taking a quiet moment to himself when he felt the tug on his internal radar. A good guy, he noted, glad that he wouldn’t have to bloody up any bad guys in as pretty a place as this. The last time he’d had a fight in this sort of area, though…a hand went to his cheek, remembering the sting of Sailor Portia’s pen on his face. Just because someone pinged as a good guy didn’t mean they were a good guy.
So Blarney remained tucked behind a tree, peering out of the shadows until the mental radar-dot materialized into…
Blarney blinked.
A little kid?
Like, a little kid. But clearly a little kid who was powered up. How…was that possible. Surely they didn’t let kids do this? Like, literal children? But–he couldn’t argue with what was in front of his very eyes, and what was in front of his very eyes was a little girl, very much pinging his powered radar, very much looking every bit like a Sailor Scout.
…Well, he had to greet her. But he also had to not seem like a creep. Staying in the woods was definitely creepier than announcing his presence.
So Blarney made a show of clearing his throat and stomping his feet a bit, knowing he was being loud enough to get the girl’s attention. Then he poked out from behind the tree and made a show of looking surprised to see her.
“Oh! Hey there,” he said, giving her a little wave. “I’m Blarney, Page of Earth. They’re beautiful, aren’t they?” Blarney asked, gesturing to the fireflies around them. “Everything okay?”
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Posted: Mon Jul 14, 2025 6:55 pm
Aquitania looked up, startled at the sound of someone else approaching. An older boy, possibly around Khaz’s age, in greens and browns, with gold trim, a flower crown, and wielding a stick, introducing himself as a Page of Earth. A knight? Neat.
The chibi smiled, waving back.
“Hi, I’m Sailor Aquitania, Chibi Senshi of Courage, just out on a patrol,” she replied with a little curtsey, before returning her attention to the fireflies. “I’ve seen the normal ones before, but always later in the summer. I think I’ve heard about these, but it seemed a little too fantastical at the time,” she admitted. The memories were hazy, because they’d seemed like the kind of stories kids would tell as campfire stories, or because they’d heard them from other people they trusted, or because they wanted to show off, so she’d written them off.
Thinking back on it from the perspective of a senshi, that had been too simplistic an approach, but one couldn’t be expected to trust in magic when the world around you was insisting magic wasn’t real. Aquitania shook her head a little. “They’re really beautiful, though, so I’m glad I finally got to see them.”
So Blarney was a knight? The other knights she’d seen had had more dramatic weapons and sometimes even a little bit of armor. Blarney had pauldrons and bracers, and carried a stick. But he’d also called himself a page, so maybe he was the most basic level of knight?
“I’m sorry if this comes out rude or weird, but I take it you’re new to being a knight?” she asked pleasantly. “I mean, I haven’t been doing this for very long, either, just since March, but it’s a whole new world, huh?”
Around them, the lights flashed and winked through a neon rainbow, seeming to take little notice of them.
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Posted: Mon Jul 14, 2025 7:40 pm
Wow, he was getting called out by a middle-schooler. He tried to put aside his pride, giving her another smile. “Yeah, you’ve got a couple months on me,” he said with a chuckle.
“Senshi of Courage, huh?” Blarney asked, quirking his eyebrow slightly. He hadn’t met all that many Senshi, in the grand scheme of things, but courage was more along the lines of what he thought Senshi spheres would be. He guessed it kind of went along with ‘embarrassment’, insofar as it was more of a concept or an emotion than a physical thing, like earthquakes.
“That’s pretty cool. Is it rude to ask what abilities that gives you?” Blarney asked. “I haven’t met all that many Senshi at all, and I’m curious what you guys can do.” Blarney said with a smile. He still didn’t really get how a literal child was allowed to do this, when people could and did literally die, but…well, nobody put him in charge of Magical Rules. “And I’ve never met any Senshi as young as you either, I admit–not a drag on you or anything, no judgement, just–you’re ahead of the game, huh?”
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Posted: Mon Jul 14, 2025 9:18 pm
Aquitania shrugged with a smile. “Yup, Courage. I can inspire courage in the people around me. I think I can also push back negative emotions a little bit. But my magic’s a little unstable, and I think that’s normal for a chibi senshi, because it sounds like chibi senshi might be caused by extenuating circumstances,” she added. Given things like the Calamitous Hollow, and other dangerous things out there, it honestly made sense that children her age becoming senshi were quite rare, because the higher powers probably didn’t intend for children her age to see actual battle until they were old enough to handle it.
That said, the fact that people who were pretty peaceful people, like her older brother, were also senshi, and his magic was defensive, while others had different types of magic…that sort of put a dent in that theory, so maybe the system was gauging “preparedness” on some other criteria. Which was probably more relevant in times where the senshi peacefully hung out on their homeworld and didn’t live in a warzone on a foreign planet, because their homeworld had been too depopulated for the senshi to be reborn properly.
Not the happiest of thoughts, really, to consider how messed up the whole current era was.
The chibi shook her head slightly, dislodging such thoughts. They weren’t right for a night like this. “That said, I think age and experience don’t have as much to do with things as ‘what do you bring to all of this’ as a person, like your experiences and desires. My–I know a senshi who works hard to protect the people around him,” she said, hurriedly covering up the near-admission her brother was another senshi. “He’s not a fighter by any stretch of the imagination, but he cares a whole awful lot about the people around him, so he works extra hard to do what he can. And I think that’s a good thing. He doesn’t like the idea of kids like me on the battlefield, either, but he knows that chibi senshi like me can do stuff, too. I think, if you bring a good attitude, positive goals, and a desire to help and to learn, you’ll do great.”
Noticing a firefly hovering close to her, Aquitania extended a finger. It alighted for just a second, but the second was electrifying in an additional way.
“Owww!” she yelped, retracting the finger and sucking on it. “That hurt,” she snapped at the firefly, which had already changed colors and gone buzzing back into the swarm, oblivious to the harm it had caused.
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Posted: Mon Jul 14, 2025 9:21 pm
Blarney winced, darting forward to her to look at her hand. “Fireflies don’t usually bite,” he said sympathetically. He didn’t actually know if it was a bite or a sting or what, but all the same, he pulled a bandaid from his subspace - it was pink with kittens on it - and held it up for her to see, a question - she could put it on herself, or he could, or she could decide she didn’t need the kitten-covered moral support. “Might not actually have any healing abilities or anything, but it might make you feel better!” Blarney grinned winningly, glancing around at the fireflies around them. “Figures nothing beautiful in this town comes without a painful price,” he said with a shake of his head. “I love this city, even more since I awoke, but–man, what if the fireflies were just nice, right?” Blarney sighed softly. “I think you’re right, though. About age and experience meaning less than what you do with what you have. I think that’s true for non-magic stuff too, though - like, if everybody made just a little more effort to be a little kinder, a little bit of a better person, the whole world would be like, a bazillion times nicer for everybody to live in.” Blarney smiled wryly, feeling cynical - a rare feeling for the generally optimistic Page. “But, at the same time, there’s people like you, and your Senshi friends, and my friends that go out all the time even though literally nobody asked for this.” Except for him - he had kind-of-sort-of asked for this. Hoped for it, anyway. “Speaking of my friends - they all tell me all the time that I shouldn’t go out patrolling alone,” he said, quirking an eyebrow at her. “Do your friends tell you the same thing, or do I get to be the hypocritical one this time?” Blarney asked, gesturing around them to point out that he wasn’t exactly listening to those friends at the moment.
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Posted: Mon Jul 14, 2025 9:23 pm
Aquitania proffered her finger, smiling at the cute Band-Aid. “It zapped me, and it didn’t feel like something a firefly should be able to do,” she added. “But this is cute, thank you so much!” the chibi beamed up at him.
Then the smile faded, turning pensive, as she turned to regard the fireflies again, this time keeping her fingers to herself. “If all things come with a price, I don’t think it’s a very consistently applied price. That said, I don’t think we should get too obsessed with prices; sometimes, the rain that falls before the rainbow forms is a blessing in and of itself, with the rainbow as a final gift from the rain. If you lived in a desert, or some other dry place, I think the rain would be just as beautiful as the rainbow, and if you plan properly for how the weather works in your area, or can afford to do so, I think there may not be a price to seeing that rainbow.”
What she didn’t voice was her own painful thoughts. Her mom said her dad loved them, Khaz said he was an easily manipulated deadbeat, but if her dad really did love them, then he was paying an impossibly steep price that the chibi desperately wished he didn’t have to pay. Just as sometimes the rain was more gift than price, sometimes, prices could be unreasonable for all of the people involved.
But she didn’t say that, because it felt wrong to worsen the cynical thoughts that already seemed to percolate in the older boy’s mind.
“Ummm…I haven’t really done much patrolling yet, but once I know more people, I’ll probably do it with other people, because spending time with the people I care about, even patrolling for trouble, or for people in need, means a lot to me, and I’d rather make the whole thing more fun, you know?” the chibi said with a slight shrug. Khaz had been busy lately, but she’d definitely want to patrol with him. If Keesh ever got powers, the three of them could all patrol together, which would be even better. Aquitania smiled at the thought, and then popped out her senshi phone.
“Speaking of which! Wanna trade numbers and maybe patrol a little bit together? I can’t stay out real late, but if you want, we can be friends and patrol together, right?” she asked with a grin of the older Knight. After all, friends were where you found them.
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Posted: Mon Jul 14, 2025 9:33 pm
Blarney grinned back at her, relieved she’d made the offer so he didn’t have the awkwardness of inviting himself along with a little kid. “Happy to,” Blarney said, taking her phone and entering his information - now that his ring had the ability to not only communicate with Senshi phones but also, he had only discovered earlier that day, use the Connections app - and then saved it to his signet ring. “You can call or message me any time, too,” he added. “You really shouldn’t go out alone if you can help it, but I shouldn’t either, so really you’d be doing me a favor if you give me a shout,” he added with a laugh. With a playful bow, Blarney said, with twinkling eyes, “It would be my honor to be your friend, Sailor Aquitania, Senshi of Courage.”
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