A word of warning: Due to this mission’s nature (Agent!Sergio’s first one, somewhere in January 2009 HST) and the nature of the two collaborations with Firemagic, from now on the missions posted here will NOT be in chronological order.
This mission, as the title says, is the very first, while the next ones will be set between Mission #4 (A Very Awkward Exorcism) and Collaboration #1 (Legendary Illogic).
In this mission, we’ll see a deeply different Agent Sergio Turbo, still a rookie and partnered with a certain famous Bad Slasher. I also want to thank my beta-readers: Firemagic, StarAlbatross, SingingTheThunder and Desdendelle.
Luxury was waiting in trepidation in her RC. She had just received a console message from the Marquis, informing her that she was getting a rookie Agent as a partner.
The rookie had a Latin sounding name – Spanish, or maybe Italian. Could it be a chance of getting a latin lover all for herself?
The sound of someone knocking at her door woke Luxury from her daydreaming. The Agent opened the door and greeted her new partner.
“Hi! You must be Sergio, right?”
“Yes. Are you Agent Luxury?”
The brown haired guy standing in the door frame was young – early twenties, perhaps. He was tall, maybe even six feet, but had a lean build.
He was wearing black trousers and a red jacket, the latter with a Bad Slash flash patch pinned on one of the sleeves, and on his head a red Rambo-style bandana clashed with a pair of regular glasses. The guy had also a military backpack and a gym bag, presumably containing his belongings, and was holding a M16 assault rifle.
What actually caught Luxury’s attention was Sergio’s expression, though. His brown eyes were cold, and there was no trace of a smile on his face. Not exactly what she had hoped for, but maybe she could find a way to warm him up a little. After all, he wasn’t bad looking.
“Of course I am, silly! The one and only Luxury, at your service!” Luxury said with a wink, “and yes, my name’s what I am good at!”
Sergio answered her with a glare.
“C’mon, I was trying to cheer you up a little!”
“Sorry, but I am not in the mood right now. Can I drop my stuff there?”
Sergio pointed at an empty corner, contrasting with the rest of Luxury’s RC, filled with her… interesting stuff.
“Uhm, sure.”
Luxury watched the rookie Agent lay down his belongings. She was curious about him.
“So… Where are you from? Your name sounds Spanish.”
Sergio turned towards her.
“I’m Italian, actually. From some sort of ‘original continuum’, according to the stupid daisy.”
Luxury noticed the disdain with which Sergio pronounced “stupid daisy”. Most Agents disliked the Marquis, but never by their first hour on the job. The female Agent wanted to ask him more, but…
[BEEEEEEEEEP!]
Sergio took up his rifle and aimed it at the source of the sound.
“Don’t shoot!”
“What’s that?”
“Just the console. We have a new mission.”
Sergio’s cold stare was replaced by a puzzled look.
“Wait, that thing does that every time?”
“Yes. You will get used to it. Does that mean this is your first time?”
“Going into bad fanfiction and fixing stuff? Yes. Fighting something? No. In fact, I fought enough weird stuff that Mary Sues don’t sound weird at all.”
Luxury smirked. He was a quite interesting rookie.
“And about doing that? I heard Italians are good at it.”
Sergio’s cold stare returned.
“None of your business. Shouldn’t we get going?”
“Well, yes. Did you get your gear already?”
Sergio fished some gadgets from his pockets.
“They gave me this stuff. Not sure about how they work, but I’ll manage.”
“Don’t worry about that, your sexy senior will teach you everything!”
Sergio frowned.
“Did you just get a crush on me or do you try to get into everyone’s pants? No, wait, I don’t want to know.”
The poorly matched duo walked over to the console, and Luxury opened the mission assignment.
“This fic is set in Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha. Do you know it, right?”
“Yes, I do. Watched it with a friend.”
“Good, because I’ve never been there. Any idea about the disguises?”
“Disguises?” Sergio asked, “I thought the patch they gave me makes us invisible to the characters.”
“Only the canonical ones, unfortunately. But that’s not bad, setting disguises on the console is fun! So, what are you suggestions?”
The rookie Agent looked at the screen.
“Uhm, let me think. This thing is set either in public places or private homes, so it’s probably the same whatever we choose.”
Luxury smiled.
“Then I will get one of those sexy sailor fuku school uniforms! And you…”
“Just make my character design fit or something. I’m perfectly fine with my own clothes.”
“You’re quite a spoilsport, you know? And I was beginning to think you were some sort of hero…”
Sergio stared at the other Agent with a pained expression.
“What made you think that?”
“Didn’t you say you fought against weird enemies? I’d love to be the damsel in distress saved from the monsters by a knight in shining armor…”
Sergio chuckled. That girl was just as crazy as the alien telepathic flowers. However, the chuckle was quickly replaced by a sad smile.
“I’m not an hero, Luxury. Never have been, and never will be. I’m just someone who’s trying to atone for his sins.”
“Oh, don’t worry about that, I’m a naughty girl too! You didn’t look like one who likes kinky stuff, though.”
Sergio stared at her, eyes wide open. He barely managed to say exactly one word.
“… What.”
When the two Agents stepped out of the portal, they found themselves in an undefined grey space. Sergio looked around and frowned.
“I set the portal thingy wrong, didn’t I?”
“Not at all. It’s just pre-fic space. It doesn’t tend to last long, though. A shame, since it’s a place with nearly perfect privacy. I still remember that time when the fic threw me and this Assassin in a snowstorm while still naked…”
“A chilling experience.”
Luxury started laughing.
“You do have a sense of humour, then!”
Sergio’s retort was cut off by a booming voice.
A (K)Night of Lost Memories
Summary/Preview
“What’s that?” Sergio asked, his rifle ready again to shoot at any hostile target.
“It’s the Generic Voice that tells the title of the story, Author Notes and all the other annoying stuff.”
Hayate Yagami once had a strange book that seemed to one night produced 4 strangers out of nowhere and is said to bring its owner (her) unsurpassed power once it’s pages are collected.
Sergio put away his rifle and covered his ears.
“Not only this voice is loud enough to give me an headache, but it also needs some grammar lessons!”
Luxury pulled out a notebook and started scribbling down.
“The bad grammar goes on the charge list. Did they already tell you how a mission goes?”
Sergio started counting on his fingers.
“One, write down all the bad stuff that happens during the fanfiction. Two, if it is caused by a Sue or a Wraith, subdue and charge it. Three, forcibly remove whatever caused the fanfiction. Four, wipe the canon characters’ memories and leave them in a canonically-plausible status and location.”
Luxury nodded.
“Very good. It doesn’t look like I have to teach you much. Want to try catching charges yourself?”
Luxury extended the notepad to Sergio, who took it.
“Sure.”
“If you do well, you’ll get a special treat when we get back.” Luxury added with a wink. The rookie Agent decided to just ignore her.
“Shall we get back to work? The stupid daisy told me that we have to find all the charges.” Sergio frowned, “I still don’t get why, though. Kill the Sue, problem solved.”
Nevertheless, Sergio wrote the next ones, “Giving a butchered and useless synopsis of the Book of Darkness Incident” and “Inserting nonsensical notes in-text”, in the notebook.
“Well, they do have some uses. When dealing with Author Wraiths they’re useful for exorcising them. The more stuff you shout, the better it works.”
“I see.”
This is a definite example of amnesia with a personality change, and how even nice people can harbor monstrous demons inside them. (Yandere-type people. ^-^)
Sergio blinked. Just before that, the voice had said that the story was about Shamal.
“Wait, WHAT? Shamal’s one of the kindest people in the entire series. I can’t remember her being truly angry even once!”
“And ‘Yandere’ doesn’t mean ‘nice person harbouring demons’. It means ‘apparently cute but aggressively insane about the person they obsess about’. They can be really sweet if you’re careful, though,” Luxury added.
Note: On DeviantArt, this is the Second Version, which was completely redone to better understanding.
Sergio rubbed his head.
“Any idea on what that meant?”
“I think it’s saying that a better version is on the author’s DeviantArt account, but I’m not sure.” Luxury said, “However, judging by the note’s grammar…”
“The chances of it actually being better are non-existent,” Sergio completed for her.
The voice went on explaining how Shamal could do only healing.
“Oh, yes. Because everyone can do only the kind of magic they specialize in. I can name at least three other kinds of magic Shamal can do,” Sergio muttered while scribbling on the notepad.
She sometimes wonders how much the other Knights are going to last, with one mission starting minutes after another, and some going into the nighttime hours.
“That doesn’t sound like something a true military would do,” Luxury commented.
“At all. People need to rest, and this perp thinks the TSAB only deals with fighting. I want to drag him into a REAL military and show him how stuff actually works there. I bet that he wouldn’t last a single day.”
“Hey, you should calm down a bit! We’re not allowed to bash the author, you know?”
Sergio didn’t answer. Luxury sighed.
“Listen, most people here think I’m a ditz and it’s probably true, but I can see that there’s something wrong with you. If you keep being this aggressive, you’re only going to get yourself killed or go insane. And insane people aren’t that good in bed.”
“Like I care about what happens to me.”
Luxury wanted to scold him for such words, but both Agents were distracted by the pre-fic space resolving into the living room of the Yagami household, where Hayate and Shamal were watching some television.
“Ok, remember: the SEP field hides us well, but if you shout or bump into something they’ll probably notice,” Luxury advised.
“Don’t worry, I did more than enough sneaking missions under my previous employer.”
As Hayate’s worrying about Shamal’s condition was quite repetitive and Sergio seemed to have already calmed down, Luxury decided to try to ask a bit more about him.
“So, you were some kind of soldier?”
“Yes. I was in a Private Military Company, but I… I’d like to not speak about it.”
“I’m sorry.”
Sergio noticed that Luxury’s playful tone had died down.
“It’s not your fault.”
The discussion was interrupted by an unmarked scene shift throwing both of them on the ground.
Sergio quickly got on his feet again, and looked around. Now they were in the middle of a Mid-Childan city… or rather, what would look like one if it wasn’t made completely from Generic Surface.
“What the hell happened? Where are we?”
“Scene shift. The fic just threw us in the next location. A city called Midchilda, it seems.”
Sergio blinked a couple of times.
“Wait, what? Name’s Mid-Childa, with an hyphen between “Mid” and “Childa”. And that’s the name of the entire planet, not a city.”
Sergio added that to the charge list. In the meanwhile, the Wolkenritter flew in formation over the city.
“Oh, great.” Sergio frowned, “Should’ve brought a directional microphone. How do we listen to what they say if they are flying well over our heads?
“By reading the Words, silly!” Luxury said, “Stare at the sky or a blank surface and unfocus your eyes. The text of the fic should appear.”
Sergio stared at her instead.
“Are you kidding? How could such a thing work?”
“Well, it does?”
Sergio sighed.
“It’s not like I didn’t see a lot of weird stuff already, so I’ll give it a try. Don’t jump on me while I am not paying attention, or I’ll shoot you.”
“Aw, spoilsport!”
Sergio unfocused his eyes while staring at a wall, and the text did indeed appear in front of his eyes. However, the Ironic Overpower wasn’t pleased by his display of skepticism, so the Words appeared in the hard-to-read Mid-Childan font.
“I’d like for this to go on without a fight for once,” spoke Vita, telepathically.
“Wouldn’t we all,” said the bold Signum, in the same manner. “I bet you need the most rest, Shamal.”
“Hayate told you, didn’t she?” responded the mage.
“She didn’t. I’ve noticed it for a while. What did she say?”
“She and I think we all should come back to Earth and then take a vacation. So we all regain our strength.”
“It’s about damn time,” interrupted Vita.
“I’m up for one, myself,” spoke Zafira, the dog-knight.
“Dog… Knight?”
Sergio kept staring at the wall. Then started laughing.
“Oh my… I should be angry because Zafira shapeshifts into a wolf, but…”
Sergio was doubled over with laughter, and Luxury started worrying. Had he snapped ten minutes into his first mission?
“Sergio… are you alright?”
“Yes, don’t worry. Zafira the doggy is quite a joke among the fandom. I’m afraid you don’t get it, do you?”
“No, but you did need to laugh a bit. You’re too tense, you know?”
“It’s not like I don’t have a reason to… GET DOWN!”
Some sort of blur had hit Shamal, and she crashed into a building. After shielding himself from the blinding debris, which happened to be chunks of concrete with mind-bending shapes, Sergio pulled out his rifle again and started searching for the source of the attack.
“Luxury, stay close and keep an eye out for the attacker. Do you have a weapon?”
“No, and I don’t need it. We can’t be seen, remember?”
Sergio lowered his gun.
“… Right.”
“And could you please put that rifle away? You’ll end up accidentally shooting someone.”
Sergio sighed and complied. In the meantime, after just a basic vital signs check, the other three Knights started searching for the attacker.
“Wrong, very wrong,” Sergio said, “one of them should have checked Shamal for injuries while the others provided cover. For all they know, she might be severely injured and in need of immediate MedEvac. And, besides, leaving a wounded teammate alone on the ground? That’s stupid.”
As if they were listening, the Knights came back and teleported Shamal to the Yagami Household before resuming the search.
“Wait… Why?… How?…” Sergio was left with no words.
“Shouldn’t a hospital or the medical section of a military base be a better choice?” Luxury asked.
“Exactly. And, besides, you aren’t supposed to be able to teleport people this freely in Nanoha, they have regulations about magic. They should have asked Mission Control authorization, or at least reported that one of them is down and being teleported to a safe location. Hell, they require permits even to fly while in a city!”
Luxury was puzzled.
“Wasn’t this show about magical girls?”
“Yeah, but there’s a reason why it is described as ‘Card Captor Sakura meets Gundam’. It’s a good series, you should take the time to…”
Sergio was interrupted by another scene shift. The two Agents ended up in a tangled heap on the floor of the Yagami Household.
“Don’t tell me that you get aroused by Magical Girl shows! You missed the targets for a grope, though,” Luxury winked, “try again!”
“What? No!” The Agent instinctively retracted as much as possible from his partner.
“Besides, I’m a bit too old now to be falling in love with a twelve-year-old girl!”
“I smell Lust Object here. But I’m glad you think that, if you did anything to kids I wouldn’t like you anymore. So, who is the girl that made your heart go ba-dump?”
“I am not going to tell you,” Sergio flatly stated.
“I must know that. It’s a rule; every Agent has to know his partner’s Lust Object in order to prevent glomping.”
Sergio sighed, fully believing Luxury’s little lie.
“Alright. Kinomoto Sakura, Card Captor Sakura. And before you say anything, I was only a couple of years older than her back when I got this crush, OK? I’d have to meet a version of her around my age to feel something now.” Sergio frowned, “Happy now? And yours is?… Wait, I’m afraid I know the answer already. Anyone.”
The two Agents were distracted by Hayate’s sobbing.
“I went to get a bowl of water for her wound after I change her into regular clothes, but she‒hic‒she was gone!”
Sergio started banging his head on the nearest wall.
“One, a bowl of water isn’t enough for any kind of injury.” –thud-. “Two, in this canon there are healing spells,” –thud-. “and Shamal isn’t the only one capable of doing those.” –thud-. “Three, you don’t have to change out of a freaking Barrier Jacket!” –thud-. “They revert back to normal clothes automatically!” –thud-.
Sergio stepped back from the wall, struggling to keep his balance due to the blunt-trauma-induced dizzyness. Luxury raised an eyebrow in concern.
“That wasn’t a great idea, you know?”
“The stupid… it hurts…”
Sergio shook his head and recovered a bit of lucidity just in time to listen to Signum explaining Shamal’s “problem”. Apparently, getting overworked would cause her to become amnesiac and start killing people by the hundreds… and it already happened in the past.
“Not nice, not nice,” Luxury commented, “if someone has the risk of suffering amnesia and disturbed personality from exhaustion, you don’t keep it hidden. And you don’t allow her to get overworked, it’s just asking for trouble… and not the fun kind.”
“That’s on top of the fact that Shamal doesn’t have such a condition in the first place,” Sergio added while rubbing his forehead.
“She went looking for herself, which is what she might be doing right now. But since people aren’t aware of us Knights or mages altogether, disaster might come to the most unfortunate.”
“Sergio, didn’t you say that this TSAB was a military force?”
“Yeah. People do know about it, and in fact Hayate and her Knights are known. Hayate’s one of the three Aces, after all. Not to mention that magic is supposed to be mundane here.”
Sergio kept scribbling, but stopped halfway and started shaking the pen.
“Out of ink. Do you have a spare?”
Luxury snatched another one from a nearby table in response. Sergio raised an eyebrow.
“… Is that allowed?”
“Uhm, no. But nicking little things here and there is tolerated. It’s not like they’re going to notice that a pen is missing.” Luxury glanced at the Words, and continued. “Scene shift incoming!”
The two Agents got thrown on the ground again.
“Ow. Isn’t there a way to avoid that?” Sergio asked while getting up.
They were now in a dumpster-strewn alleyway, which appeared to be an alley with both sides lined up with dozens of dumpsters. Luxury ended up with her back on the ground and her legs lying on one of the dumpsters’ sides, in a rather funny sitting-upside-down position.
“Well, usually we have the time to open a portal and skip the scene shift,” Luxury explained, “but this one keeps piling them up. Oh, look! I’ve got some kind of magical skirt.”
The skirt of Luxury’s sailor fuku uniform refused to obey to gravity, thus saving her (rather non-existent) modesty.
“Aren’t you happy?” Sergio asked, “It would have been quite awkward if you ended up giving me a panty shot.”
“But I wanted to!”
“… What’s wrong with you?”
Sergio frowned, and then stared at the endless array of dumpsters.
“Hey, Luxury. Do you think the canon is trying to convey a message here?”
Luxury got up and glanced at the environment.
“‘This story is rubbish’? I guess so.”
Once the two of them caught sight of Shamal, they followed her while she stumbled around in her amnesiac status. The Knight didn’t seem to be aggressive at all, just confused.
“She is acting quite reasonably for an amnesiac version of herself for now.” Sergio noted.
Her eyes glance left and right. Nothing seemed to click.
“Who am I? I just don’t know anything. All I know is that there’s something I have to
remember. But what?”
They darted to a muscular man smoking in the light of an outdoor street lamp. “He might
help me.”
“Hiya, missy,” the man said with a gruff voice. “What’s your name?”
Shamal looked to the man’s face with a lost look. “I…I don’t know.”
“Say what?”
“I don’t know…my name.”
“Are you dumb?”
“I just don’t know‒!” The mage became scared as the man grabbed her arm sharply.
The two Agents stared in shock as the man proceeded to thoroughly beat the crap out of the poor Shamal.
“That was totally uncalled for!” Sergio growled. He started reaching for his rifle, when Luxury grabbed his arm.
“We cannot interfere with the story until we have enough charges, you know?”
“What if that madman kills her? Aren’t we supposed to avoid that?”
“Read the Words. It isn’t going to happen. And if it was… well, we have solutions for that too.”
Sergio crossed his arms in disbelief.
“Doesn’t feels like the right modus operandi to me.”
“Well, when this fic is killed the canon snaps into place. It will be like this thing never happened in the first place,” Luxury explained, “don’t worry, you’ll get used to how things work here soon.”
Sergio didn’t look like he was completely convinced, but he didn’t try to reach for his gun again, which was a good sign.
In the meanwhile, the man was over with Shamal and threw her in a dumpster.
The blonde shot a glare at him, violet eyes becoming dark. She stood up, ignoring the pain and keeping her balance steady with the dumpster. “How…” she snarled under her breath.
“How…fucking stupid of you!”
“Stupid?” snapped the man.
Shamal felt around the contents of the dumpster until she felt a golf club.
“Oh, she’s angry now!” Luxury cheered.
“While I can’t picture Shamal doing that, I can understand the reaction,“ Sergio added, “what I want to know is why there is a perfectly serviceable golf club in a dumpster.”
“Maybe Lord Implausibility threw that in.”
Sergio raised an eyebrow.
“I’m not going to ask who Lord Implausibility is.”
Luxury looked like she was going to tell that anyway, but she had to shield herself from the blood that was starting to fly everywhere as Shamal kept hitting the man with the golf club.
Once the guy was dead, Shamal walked out of the alley using the same club as a makeshift crutch.
“… Wow. This Shamal woman went a bit overboard, didn’t she?”
Sergio stared down at the mangled body.
“It’s not like this guy deserved any better. In a way, I am glad that he’s already dead. He wouldn’t have been worth the bullets, as much as I wanted to kill him.”
Luxury stared at her partner. While she didn’t have anything against killing evil Generics, Sergio’s attitude was quite off-putting.
“You’re being scary now, you know? You sound like one of those emotionless contract killers. Not that those can’t be sexy, but…”
“I used to kill people like him for a living, Luxury,” Sergio sighed, “besides, I don’t want to let this kind of bastard run around in Ami’s favourite series. She wouldn’t like it at all.”
“I see. Ami’s the friend you talked about earlier, right?”
Sergio gave her a quizzical look.
“Yes, why?”
“What kind of friend was she?”
If Sergio could shoot laser beams from his eyes, his glare would have been enough to incinerate Luxury on the spot.
“Not the kind you are suggesting. She is just fifteen, too!… She was.”
Sergio started looking down. Luxury wasn’t a genius, but it didn’t take her much to understand what it meant.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t want to bring up bad memories.”
Luxury decided that it was better for her to keep her mouth shut for the entirety of the next scene, in which Signum gave a nonsensical explanation of Shamal’s condition. Apparently she was bound to become overly aggressive if she was left wandering around in her status long enough, and the last time it happened she was apparently able to kill hundreds of people even without help from magic or her Device (which, in an interesting lone example of common sense, self-deactivated to reduce Shamal’s dangerousness).
The following one wasn’t much better. It began with Signum tracking down Shamal, who was doing her best to slaughter a group of six Generic Thugs in the most graphic ways possible. One got stabbed with the remains of the golf club, another got ripped apart bare-handedly, and the third one got shot with his own gun.
“This is not Shamal,” Sergio stated while he witnessed the death of the fourth one, “when did she become that competent in non-magical fighting?”
Luxury stared at Shamal grabbing the last one and shouting at him.
“Uhm, it feels like something else is off now.”
“… Yeah, You’re right.”
The Agents stared at the four dead bodies, and then at the fifth thug in Shamal’s hands.
“Uhm…” Sergio started, “Weren’t they six?”
“Yes, they were. Poor guy, math failures are always the worst.”
“… But where did he go? People can’t evaporate!”
Luxury shrugged.
“Bad grammar does that. And you’ve seen nothing yet!”
“This place is weird.”
In the meanwhile, the remaining thug was screaming, calling Shamal a monster.
“I see.” She straighten her posture and exposed a now emotionless glare. “If I’m called a
monster, then a monster I shall be.”
“No, you shall not!” Signum shouted as she revealed herself in her civilian attire. “Unlike this man here, I have what you desire.”
“And just who the hell are you?”
“A friend. One who knows who you really are.” The Knight then turned to the gangster on Shamal’s other side. “Wanna live? Start running.”
The thug dashed as fas as he could…
… only for his gut to meet the stock of Sergio’s rifle. The thug fell on the ground, lacking enough air in his lungs (or enough characterization, for that matters) to even protest.
He never had the chance to regain his breath, as Sergio produced a combat knife and slit his throat.
“Luxury, do we have to dispose of the bodies of our kills in a particular way?”
“Generics tend to disappear when they are no longer needed, so I think we can leave him here. It’s a different story for Sues or their menageries, though. We have to either destroy the bodies, or drop them somewhere out of the canon.” Luxury stopped for a bit, and then continued. “Cute Animal Friends are the best source for skins. I once skinned this blue unicorn…”
“Not interested.”
In the meanwhile, Shamal was asking Signum how she could recover her memories.
“How should I do that?”
“Just follow my instructions. They may sound ridiculous at first, but when it’s all done,
everything will come in full circle of you.”
“OK, what now?”
“Remove your clothes first,” the sword woman said with a stern face.
The mage couldn’t believe the command. “That’s absurd.”
“Yeah, I can’t believe that either,” Sergio agreed.
However, Shamal complied, leading to a blushing Sergio turning away from the scene.
“Don’t want to take a look?”
“Are you kidding? She’s way older than me!”
Luxury kept staring alternatively at the Knight and at Sergio.
“You look about the same age, actually.”
“I’m seventeen. And she’s a magical construct several centuries old. But why am I telling that to you? I don’t think you would care.”
Luxury raised an eyebrow.
“You sure are prudish, aren’t you? Oh, look! Whatever magic Signum is using, it needs a kiss to work!”
“I said I’m not going to look!”
The spell seemed to work, and a now-recovered Shamal decided to drag Signum in the darkness of the alley as she “wasn’t over” with her. Then another scene shift caught the two Agents unaware once again.
“Why now? They were just getting-”
As the two Agents ended up in Signum’s bedroom, with the owner well within earshot, Sergio decided to shut Luxury’s mouth with his hand. Bad move.
“Hey!” Sergio whispered, “stop licking!”
“But I’m goooood at licking!”
“Shh!”
Sergio pointed at the sleeping Signum. Who wasn’t going to keep sleeping anyways, as a polite knock at the door woke her up.
“Come in,” she said, weary.
In came the familiar sight of a blonde mage in homemaker clothing. Shamal.
“Hello, and sorry about last night’s killing spree, Signum.”
“It’s alright, Shamal, as long as you’re alright.”
The two Agents frowned.
“Yeah, you killed people, but who cares?” Sergio complained. “It’s not like murder is a crime, isn’t it?”
“Besides, she might have killed people with a family. That’s not nice,” Luxury added. “Anyways, the fic’s nearly over. I’ll take a CAD reading to see if we have a Replacement in our hands.”
Luxury pulled out what looked like a small handheld computer and pointed it at the two characters. Sergio watched intently, as he didn’t have the time yet to figure out how the device worked.
[Signum. Female magical construct. Canon. OOC 37.888%. Neuralyze soon.]
[Shamal. Female magical construct. Canon/uncanon/cannuncanon/UNCANON. Character Replacement. Kill it.]
“Character Replacement?” Sergio asked.
“Yes. There is a limit on how much a character can be warped before ceasing to be himself,” Luxury explained, “and when that limit is reached, the true one is shoved in a plothole somewhere while a copy takes its place in the fic.”
Sergio pulled out his rifle again.
“So, shoot it without remorse?”
“Yes, but we have to charge her first.”
Shamal, on the other hand, sat and positioned herself alongside the pony tailed Knight. When Signum turned her head at the blonde, she received a kiss on the lips. It surprised her, but she didn’t move away from it.
“Let’s do it again sometime,” Shamal proposed. “But let’s skip the amnesia and just go for Second Base.”
“Er, Second?”
THE END
Signum was rather surprised by Shamal’s behaviour. But what surprised her even more were the two people that appeared out of nowhere in the middle of her room.
“Protectors of the Plot Continuum! Don’t move!”
The guy who shouted that was aiming an assault rifle towards Shamal, while the woman next to him limited herself to crossing her arms.
They didn’t look like they were from a police force – the woman was wearing a sailor fuku school uniform, even! – and Signum was still in bed.
The knight tried to think a way to turn the situation in her favour, but something was interfering with her thought processes.
“Signum, stay down. This woman is not Shamal.”
Signum’s thought processes become even more confused, as her canon memories started clashing with the fake memories induced by the fic. The two Agents took advantage of that.
“Time to read the charge list, Sergio.”
Sergio glanced at the pocket where he put the list.
“I have both hands occupied. Can you take the list? Right pocket of my jacket… I SAID JACKET!”
Luxury frowned, and took the charge list as Signum started to think that she was having some sort of strange dream.
“Not!Shamal, we are Agents Luxury and Sergio Turbo from the Protectors of the Plot Continuum, and you are charged with: replacing the character Shamal of the…”
Luxury squinted, trying to decipher Sergio’s handwriting.
“… Wokeniter?”
Sergio and Signum corrected her simultaneously.
“Wolkenritter.”
“Oh. Making Shamal into an unstable person capable of mass murder, trivializing the aforementioned mass murder, making both the Wolkenritter and the Time-Space Administration Bureau incompetent, ignoring how Nanohaverse magic actually works, adding non-existent sexual subtext between Signum and Shamal, creating an entire city out of Generic Surface, causing people to disappear due to math errors, disrespecting grammar rules and writing annoying Author Notes. The sentence is death. Any last words?”
The Shamal replacement glared at the two Agents.
“Signum is mine! I’ll kill you!”
She ran forward, fully intending to dismember the guy with the rifle… without realizing how stupid that idea was. She didn’t cover even half of the distance when Sergio started shooting, emptying an entire magazine worth of bullets on the target.
The replacement fell on the ground, mortally wounded. She attempted to use magic to heal herself, but it didn’t work.
“Why… Can’t… I… Heal…”
The Agents were quite puzzled by that too. Shamal’s Device, Klarwind, provided an answer… that the Agents didn’t understand anyway, as it was in German. Luckily, Signum provided a translation.
“Klarwind didn’t recognize this woman as Shamal, and blocked her access to mana.”
“Good,” Sergio commented while kneeling in front of the replacement. “And to think that the one making Klarwind capable of that when ‘Shamal isn’t herself’ was you.”
The Agent set aside his empty rifle and pulled out a Walther P99 pistol from his belt holster.
The replacement’s suffering was ended by a bullet to the head.
“I hope this stench will go away.”
The two Agents stepped back in Luxury’s RC. While neuralyzing Hayate and the Wolkenritter had been easy, finding the true Shamal wasn’t.
The plothole in which she was trapped was located in one of the dumpsters, and it took half an hour for the two Agents to find the right one.
“Oh, don’t worry about that,” Luxury reassured him, “I think we have the time to take a shower.”
“Good. Where are the showers in this place?”
“My Response Center has one. And it’s big enough for two,” Luxury answered with a wink.
Sergio understood immediately what she was meaning.
“No way. I’m going to search for another shower.”
The male Agent started gathering his stuff. All of it.
“Aw, don’t tell me you’re not coming back!”
“That’s right.”
Luxury started looking down. Another one going away after just one mission.
“It’s not your fault, Luxury… Not entirely, at least. I just prefer to work alone.”
Sergio started walking towards the door.
“Can we become just friends for now, then?” Luxury proposed.
“I’m afraid not,” Sergio answered without turning back, “people who become friends with me tend to get killed for it, and I don’t want to add more people to that list.”
The Marquis de Sod was working on yet another transfer – one 100% guaranteed to create another odd couple – when he heard someone knocking at his office’s door.
Come in.
The door opened, and an Agent dressed with not-so-clean black trousers and a red jacket in the same condition entered the room.
That’s an… interesting smell, Agent Turbo.
“Oh, yes? Thanks, I didn’t notice.”
Enough with the snarking, Agent Turbo. I have a lot of work to do, so whatever you have to tell me, say it quickly.
“I don’t want a nymphomaniacal partner. No, wait, I don’t want a partner at all.”
Odd couples have better mission performance than solo Agents, you know?
“Says the one who let a Sue kill my teammate, the only friend I had left, before letting his agents step in to recruit me.”
We couldn’t do anything about it due to the nature of that particular mission, and I am very sorry. I can assure you that I would have preferred to recruit Ami Tanegashima too, as she would have been a very good Agent.
“Then you should have told the two rookies you sent in to shoot Vera dead right away, instead of waiting for me to kill her when it was already too late.”
Blaming me isn’t going to bring her back, Agent Turbo. Response Center 1587 is empty, so I’ll assign that to you. Now go.
The Agent turned around and exited the room, as he realized that arguing with the Flower was a futile effort.
And stop by the showers, while you’re at it.
And now, trailers time!
PPC HQ, DoSAT lab. A girl with light blue hair is working on some kind of small spaceship, looking at the camera every now and then.
“Him? Yeah, I know him.”
Agent Corolla. Formerly Department of Floaters, Special Operation Division.
“It’s going to take a while, this is a bit of a long story.”
She now works as a technician for DoSAT.
Corolla walks away from the spaceship and stares straight into the camera.
“Did you know that there are three kind of Agents? Those who have fun while doing their job, those who live only to kill stuff, and those who have nowhere else to go. And him?
The image of a male Agent flashes on the screen. Only the silhouette is visible, but he is clearly holding an assault rifle.
“He fought to protect people.”
The scene shifts to the Sunflower Official’s office. Agents Sergio Turbo, Nikki Cherryflower and Corolla are in front of him.
“We can’t let this become public HQ knowledge. I have no choice but to assign this mission to you.”
Corolla continues to talk while on the screen are shown clips of the three Agents fighting.
“Five years ago, there was an emergency situation.”
Nikki keeps staring alternatively at the Words and the actual scene in a badfic.
“Where’s Sakura?”
Closeup on Sergio’s surprised face.
“Madoka disappeared too?”
A simple mission becomes something bigger.
Corolla types frantically on the console.
“What’s going on there?”
A buried past is back.
Sergio, standing under the snow, sighs with a defeated look on his face.
“I didn’t want you to know that.”
And a new menace is threatening the Word Worlds.
A blonde woman sips from a glass of wine.
“You can’t defeat me.”
Sergio chambers a round in his assault rifle.
“I failed too many times to give up again.”
Three Special Operations Division Agents.
Clips of Sergio, Nikki and Corolla battling several Defectives.
Several canon worlds.
Several clips of landscapes are mixed with clips showing a BMW running at high speed on a German highway, a tracked pick-up truck plowing through snow in the Alaskan wilderness and a Nissan Skyline drifting on the streets of a Japanese city.
One mission.
Sergio is hugging somebody, but most of that person is out of the screen.
“We’ll save them.”
Sergio slams his palms on the Sunflower’s desk.
“Sir, we have a Blank Sprite.”
The screen goes black, and this logo fades into appearance.
Wings Of Canon 