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 Posted: Sat Oct 18, 2025 2:00 pm
Quote: Fire Belly Newts (15) : Pranks are common this time of year, and what’s funnier than a little arson? A lot of things, actually, but for some reason there are frequent reports of small fires being set and abandoned all throughout the city. Most of the time, these fires burn out before causing much damage, but things are escalating and it’s only a matter of time before things start getting dangerous–especially with how dry it’s been, and all these dead, fallen leaves. But, it’s worse than just flammable debris. Sometimes, there are small patches of boiled pavement. Melted metal–guardrails, lamps, fire hydrants. Destruction is rampant, and no one knows why. But you do. You saw one of them. A foot long, black newt, with a bright-red belly that glowed brightly when it spat up real, liquid flame right in front of you. Lava pooled from its round little belly, ignited like a match to oil. It darts through alleys and storm drains, too fast to catch. At least you tried. Demeter sighed slightly, shifting on their feet as they waited for Lete. It had been months, now, since the battle in space against the world-eater. They'd spent most of that time thinking. Slowly figuring out how to shut off their life, prepare for leaving. They hadn't exactly... determined for sure that they'd be leaving, transforming themselves into someone wholly new, but it was better to be ready, right? They were pretty sure of what they wanted. And while it disheartened them that their planet would now end up abandoned again... The past was the past. And Demeter wanted their future to be theirs. ...His? The thought made their stomach flutter in anxious excitement, but they tried to calm down with deep breaths. This was what they were waiting to see Lete for, anyway. Leaving their life as Autumn, as a Senshi of the White Moon, and becoming... ???, Senshi of the Dark Mirror.
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Posted: Sun Oct 26, 2025 2:10 pm
Gabi’s Halloween season had been kinda sorta really the WORST, this year. Between falling into the leaves and needing Leandro to rescue bun, and the fact that those nasty gargoyles who liked throwing people around were back again, and the looming threat of Finishing Her Stupid College Degree In The Spring? Everything had been kind of a lot, and confusing, and overwhelming, and bun kinda wanted to cry. Like, what was bun supposed to do, now that bun had a big fancy degree in two things that most people considered more or less entirely useless? Go to more college? Graduate school and all that?
………Maybe? It wasn’t an entirely empty possibility? But the thought of more college also made Gabi feel like maybe God was the class clown and taking the piss out of them personally, all to make some kind of point that Gabi really didn’t understand.
It almost felt like a relief to power up, sometimes. In a lot of ways, it usually didn’t. Because after the HOLY s**t ACTUAL CHAOS CANNON WHAT THE ******** WHAT THE ******** WHAT THE ******** SINCE WHEN DID THE NEGAVERSE HAVE A CHAOS CANNON WHY WHY WHY WAS THIS A THING JESUCRISTO WHYYYYYYY, being Lete had come with an attendant sort of dread-filled feeling. Like there was a sword dangling not only Lete’s head but that of the entire Dark Mirror Court’s, and like maybe the best thing to do was just tap out from dealing with it? And Lete didn’t even know where to begin asking anybody else in the Court about that, but not thinking too much on the subject only made it come back, louder and more aggressively, in the same way as humiliating memories from years ago, right at the moment when you thought that you were finally over them.
Meeting up with Demeter was something good, though. Something much easier to deal with. True, they could never really be together in the same way as those two guys in the Court who were really aggressively protective of each other (not that Lete knew what their actual situation with each other was, but you didn’t act that intense about a person unless you really loved them and it was probably a lot easier with both of them being in the Court than it might’ve been otherwise). Still, the time she and Demeter had together while powered up meant so much to Lete. The thought of that alone—of powering up to meet with Deme under a spooky season moon with all its attendant hijinks—kept her going through a long shift at the bookstore, and then through powering up.
She just……wished that maybe, something could’ve worked out. Something so she could take Deme home with her.
When her datemate’s shock of ginger hair and pretty, very seasonally appropriate fuku came into view, Lete hesitated several paces off, just……peeking out from behind one of the trees in this corner of the park, and staring at Demeter. Taking in the view. Yearning. Feeling all pink and squishy about Demeter, the way they so often did, and wishing that the answer to the entire problem wasn’t so painfully, obviously simple.
If Lete purified, then they could be together like real people.
Or, like, if Demeter joined the Court, but Demeter probably didn’t want to, which was fair enough (for Demeter to feel and literally no one else). Draining energy was part of the whole deal, and Deme probably wouldn’t like that idea very much. Most Order senshi, in Lete’s experience, tended not to like that very much, even when you were, like, super extremely ethical and cool and humane about it! And totally not like the Negaverse at all, actually! And also it was praxis!!!
So wrapped up in buns own little thoughts about this, Lete completely failed to notice anything but Demeter……including the strange black lizard trundling around the ground where bun stood. Indeed, Lete remained oblivious to its presence until, out of nowhere, bun caught a whiff of something burning. Lete swished about looking around, trying to spot the source of the smell, and in so doing, they found it: brilliantly bright flames, climbing up the ends of their hair.
Without a thought, Lete screamed.
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