A Place to Call Home

I've never been the type to dwell on things. Even so, that doesn't mean I don't have my share of worries.

I put Kabe to bed, then walked down to the convenience store in front of the hotel and bought a can of beer and a bag of dried shredded squid. The weather had turned properly chilly — sitting at an outdoor table was a bit much, honestly — but once I pulled a thick shawl around my shoulders, it was tolerable enough.

A swallow of cold beer slid down my throat, and that sharp, tingling bite spread through my whole body. The salty chew of the squid chased the alcohol right off my tongue.

Hmm.

I scratched my temple lightly with my pinky.

What should I do?

Dusick's notebook, the one I'd seen at the conference with her teacher. It wasn't much of a notebook. The contents, though — those were something else entirely.

"High school girls going through puberty often experience a certain confusion regarding their sexual orientation."

That was what the teacher had said. In her view it was nothing serious; she was only worried that it might start affecting Dusick's attitude in class, or her grades. But was this really something I could shrug off like that? Page after page packed with my face, my name, the words unni, unni, unni written over and over — could I honestly call that nothing? Was this the kind of thing that would just pass on its own?

I turned it over and over in my head, but it wasn't the kind of problem that offered up an answer. I'd have needed to worry about something like this before, for starters. I'd never liked anyone. Never been confessed to, either. No — I'd never even been loved by anyone. For someone like me, this kind of problem was a difficulty setting way too high.

There's nothing shameful about one person having feelings for another. If Dusick was looking at me that way — romantically, I mean, or, well, we're the same gender in this case, but still — was that a bad thing? No. It wasn't.

Had she been looking at me like that this whole time?

That one feeling. That was the issue. Simple admiration for a boss, or looking up to me as her unni — that would have been fine. But if she'd been seeing me as someone she had feelings for, that was a different story entirely.

It wasn't the kind of thing I could talk over with anyone. I had to sit with it alone and decide alone, and that made the weight of it so much heavier.

I thought about it for a long time.

"Well. It should be fine."

That was my conclusion. Dusick hadn't actually confessed to me. I could hardly make a fuss over something she'd just scribbled in a notebook. It really might have been nothing more than a passing teenage feeling, the way the teacher had said. I might have been taking it too seriously. I might have been worrying over nothing at all.

I crushed the empty beer can with everything I had and stood up. There was still some shredded squid left. I figured I'd save it for Keru when he got back.

Time to head in and get some sleep. Tomorrow we were moving into the new place, after all.

Two five-ton trucks. One bus for the Mains. And one passenger car for me, Kabe, and Dusick. It was originally Eve's car — she'd sent it over, saying it would beat dealing with the subway or whatever.

"Mom, lookit this!"

I pressed the power window switch and the glass slid down. Down, then up again. Kabe kept gasping in wonder every time the window moved at the click of the switch.

"Pretty cool, huh?"

"Yeah!"

From here to Gwangmyeong wouldn't take long. It wasn't that far. Thirty minutes, maybe.

"Well then, we'll be on our way."

"Yes, drive safely."

"Of course."

With that, the driver faced forward, and the car glided off as smoothly as if it were sliding on ice.

We hadn't been on the road long. I was staring blankly out the window when I felt someone lay their hand over mine. I turned.

"Unni."

"Yeah."

It was Dusick. Her gaze rested on me, quiet and steady.

"What's up, Dusick?"

"When's the next fight going to be?"

A fight. We needed one, that much was true. But two things had to come first. One was producing Mains — and along with them, mid-commander-class units. The other was getting our hands on the magic gun Keru had gone to retrieve. Without those two pieces in place, there was no guarantee we'd win even if we did pick a fight.

"Hmm. Can you put up a soundproofing spell?"

I wished I could just use the magic myself. It was more inconvenient than I'd expected. Back when I was fully human and couldn't use magic at all, I'd never given it a second thought — but now that I'd set one foot in that world, being the only one who couldn't do what everyone around me did was genuinely irritating.

An opaque membrane wrapped around us with Dusick's chant. From here on, nothing we said would leak outside.

"First, there are two things I took away from the last fight."

"Which are…?"

Securing mid-commander-class units. I could control every Main myself, but Mains organized among themselves simply could not beat a magical girl. Judging from what Frilly had said, magical girls seemed to have their own internal ranking system. A-class, B-class, C-class. She'd called herself A-class, so that was probably branch-leader level. The Precure types below that would be B-class, and that Echo-whatever kid had been C-class. C-class we could handle with Main troops. Anything above that, though, and we'd just be burning through Mains for nothing. Which meant we needed company-commander-level units.

And then there was my complete lack of a long-range option. I figured the magic gun would take care of that, at least to some degree.

"—So I'm producing units tonight."

I'd gotten word that the production machine had finished installation last night. Tonight I'd run a trial batch of Mains, then aim for a mid-commander-class summoning.

But the more I thought about it — instead of producing Mains at all, couldn't I just keep pumping out mid-commander-class units with all this magic power I had to spare? Produce only units that could go one-on-one with a magical girl, and keep just enough Mains on hand to support them?

The thought came out of nowhere.

"It's not theoretically impossible. There's a reason we were never able to do it before, but… I think you might actually be able to, Unni."

Dusick answered after a moment, stroking her chin.

Theoretically possible, she'd said.

"What's the reason?"

"We never had enough magic power to pull it off. Just looking at what you used when you summoned Kabe last time — that amount alone was about equal ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠to the total the previous Mothers spent producing Mains at their absolute peak. After burning through that much, they'd usually be bedridden for a week."

I'd been perfectly fine, though. Just how little magic power had they been working with?

"Let's revise the strategy. We pump out mid-commander-class entities first, then assign Mains to match each one."

"I think that'll work. If it's you, Unni."

That faith of hers was so heavy I could barely breathe.

The distance wasn't much, so the drive didn't take long either. We arrived sooner than I'd expected, and the trucks packed with our moving load pulled in right behind us.

"Alright, everyone unload your stuff! Room assignments are as I told you — get to it! Understood?!"

"Yes, ma'am!"

While Dusick, who'd already transformed, barked orders at the Mains, Kabe and I stood side by side and looked up at the officetel building.

Eight stories. Brand new — construction had only just finished, and the occupancy permit had only just come through. This was ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠going to be our nest now. The first floor was zoned commercial, so various shops would be moving in eventually, but from the second floor up, every officetel unit was ours. The eighth-floor penthouse had a different layout entirely, with only three units, each set up as a family residence with four bedrooms. ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠Living spaces, properly. When I'd come to look at it in early October, I'd nearly dropped to my knees in front of Eve.

"Mom, are we gonna live here now?"

"Yeah. Nice, right?"

"It's the best!"

I scooped up the grinning Kabe and headed inside.

Everything really was brand-new. Even the plastic film on the elevator buttons was still on. To think I'd end up living in a place like this. Live long enough and you really do see everything.

The last time I'd toured the building there hadn't been a scrap of furniture, so the most I'd felt was a vague oh, nice place. Now, with everything moved in — all of it bought and placed by Eve, of course — it felt like a different world. An eighty-inch television filling an entire wall, a sofa in front of it, a table. In the kitchen, a dishwasher and an induction cooktop, an island dining table, even a high chair just the right size for Kabe. A king-size bed in the master bedroom. A single bed in Kabe's room, plus a children's desk for when she started kindergarten before long, and a complete collection of world classic fairy tales already lined up on the bookshelf.

Kabe's room had been papered in blue with a white floral pattern. The master bedroom was pink with a white floral pattern. ...What was that about.

A separate shower and a separate toilet. The master bedroom had its own shower and toilet as well. Its own washing machine, even. There was a dedicated laundry drying room, too — probably because the fine dust blowing in from China made it nearly impossible to hang anything in the sun. The layout wouldn't have lost to a luxury apartment. And they were handing this to us with no deposit and no rent. Just how rich did a person have to be for something like that to be possible?

"Dusick, once the kids are more or less settled, order some jajangmyeon or something. Can we expense that as meals?"

"We should be able to."

I pulled the corporate card from my wallet and handed it to her.

"I'll have jjamppong. Kabe?"

"I want jjajangmyeon!"

"There you have it. Dusick, eat whatever you want — not just fried rice. Got it?"

"That's…"

I gave her a look, sharp enough to cut. I knew exactly why she was hesitating. But we weren't the broke, scraping-by outfit we used to be. We weren't exactly rolling in it, but we didn't need to worry about meals the way we had in the days when we had nothing — Mother or otherwise.

"It's fine. Eat what you want. Okay?"

"Yes, ma'am. Thank you."

"Good."

Let's eat our fill. We had important work tonight, after all.