Mia loved her parents, but she felt that if she visited them too often, then to be placed within the environment of her former life would sink herself back into the mentality of it as well. She did not experience much stress as a student, but she had always been a woman who did not even recognize her trauma; she had a great many behaviors and patterns of thoughts which did not visibly stem from her past, yet whose origin could be located there regardless.
For the next few weeks, while Marisa was out on vacation, Mia spent much time with Aimee, yet stress further gripped her. With the death of Magnus, she felt herself adrift again; there were minor investigations nearby and minor hosts to kill, yet the disappearance of his loom had loosened certain emotions within her, inferiority and anger and guilt; she ruminated, as if attempting to engulf herself over what she should have already felt. She felt the slow pull of investment away from anyone else and into her partner, as if she could stow her lament into a patch of her spirit which contained herself and Aimee.
In early January 2019, she read through some of her notes before her midterm exam. While simple, there would additionally be a duel with Marisa in which she needed to apprehend her non-lethally, thus continuing the tradition of schools testing for that which has absolutely no real-world relevance.
LAVENDER MENACE
* female political activist host in the 1980s
* nondiscrimination and marriage laws codified in 1990s, said to be result of peaceful activist work (I'm sure the militia of murderous female hosts had nothing to do with it)
* UA opens female admissions, LM activity reduces afterwards (dead/alive?)
* read jessica reese's book with aimee
* not the first female host!!!
* "Urasaria does not make you moral."
She received a text from Marisa to come to her training room, and began walking there. While many students typically dressed in costumes for their exams, Mia had not chosen to do so; she had felt in a fugue of late and dealt with it by ascribing a seriousness to Urasaria that did not fully exist, as well as allowing Aimee to take care of her.
As she stepped inside Marisa's training room, she noticed Marisa was dressed in a crude mimicry of how Mia had described Magnus to her; it did not amuse Mia, but she chuckled at the appropriate times regardless.
As their duel began, Mia summoned Worldwide's blade. She felt comfortable wielding it, yet there was a dissociation she had not told anyone else of; that because the epigenetic memory of Ryumi's colony suffused through her skill in melee, there were particular estimations she could make of Ryumi now, her height and stance, other inclinations Mia could not know were her's or not; what had once been seemingly indicative of her of the general host now seemed a property of the host specific, a seal of similarity between herself and her colony.
If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.
As she would often do, she made small modifications to Worldwide's blade in density and width, primarily to seat it into a texture which Ryumi's former touch would tell her was good.
It did not take her long to apprehend Marisa with her four elements, though as they were walking out of the training room and down the hallway, Mia smelled her fire was still burning, thought it was a lingering scent, then walked back to the room to find a clear hole had burned through the floor where her scarabmetal had been. "Er, Marisa?"
"What's up?" Marisa walked back and saw it. "Oh. Wait, don't your scarabs disappear when you get out of range?"
Mia quickly reasoned it out. "...scarabmetal. Scarabmetal doesn't disappear when I'm out of range." She rubbed her forehead. "Of course. *That's* the usefulness of it. I was wondering what the point of it would be if I could simply summon fire or ice or lightning directly where the metal was, but... it's a permanent conduit for my elements, regardless of range. I'm sorry your training room had to die for my realization."
"Don't be sorry! Now I can ask you to torch anybody else's and they'll never know."
"Is that a service you're expecting me to provide in the future?"
"Ask me in a week if Danni said yes and I'll tell you."
Marisa said it with frustration, as if she was annoyed that Danni; a vegan student, mostly superfluous to this novel; had not already asked her out herself. The paradox of Marisa's attraction was that she had a labyrinthine set of standards and procedures of romance that no woman could actually match up to, yet who she judged for failing regardless. She always claimed to want a perfect woman yet never found herself attracted to one.
Mia wondered if Marisa would ever realize what Mia's father had once told her: that relationships of ease last longer than those of desire. She loved Aimee, and by now had told her so several times, heard it back more, but it was the lack of friction between them which had allowed her identity to slowly composite with Aimee's. She recalled when Aimee had fallen into a coma, and one of her first thoughts had been that she needed to tell Aimee about it.
