Don't Send Her Alone
Pushing aside the frustration that had been burning a hole through my gut, the weekend finally arrived.
A peaceful Saturday morning with not a single monster alert sounding.
And how was I spending that golden stretch of time?
"Blub—gah!"
Teddy, waterboarded.
No—washed.
"Hold still, you little shit."
I grabbed the thrashing arms and torso of the bear mascot flailing for the surface and shoved him back into the center of the basin. Scrubbing him raw with soapy water, dumping the filthy runoff, refilling with clean water and turning it into suds again—over and over for a solid few dozen minutes.
I hauled the dripping teddy out of the basin and casually tipped the soapy water down the drain with my free hand. Finally I brought my nose close and gave a few experimental sniffs.
Mission accomplished: the concentrated garbage-dump stench that had soaked deep into the stuffing was successfully buried under fabric softener and soap.
"Hrrk, blech…"
"Okay. Pass."
"Guhhh-weeeeh…"
I seized just the torso like wringing out a rag and squeezed hard; a groan that could have been agony or nausea spilled out of him. The fragrant liquid dribbling from his mouth like drool made it painfully clear his belly was still full of soapy water and softener.
I clipped the still-dripping teddy to the laundry line high in the bathroom and rolled my pant legs back down.
"Can I use the bathroom now?"
The second I stepped out, Siyeon paused her video and asked.
"Yeah."
I kicked off the bathroom slippers and headed straight out to prep for the mart. Thinking about picnic day, better to get everything ready as soon as possible. The lunchboxes were supposed to arrive today or tomorrow; I needed to plan how I was going to pack them too…
Elementary school parents really have it rough.
Watching myself act more and more like Siyeon's parent, I couldn't help thinking that standing in a guardian's shoes meant worrying about every little thing.
I jammed my sneakers on, heels scrunching, and called through the bathroom door in case Siyeon looked for me while I was gone.
"I'm heading to the mart—"
"Okaaay—!"
Her half-muffled but cheerful reply carried over from beyond the door. Confirmed she'd heard me, I stepped out onto the street without a care.
Ingredients for fried rice…
After arriving at the mart, shopping checklist. For fried rice: eggs, canned ham, and some flakes to sprinkle on the rice. One ten-pack carton of eggs, one can of ham, one four-pack of rice flakes. A microwaveable instant rice pack too—once you stir-fry everything the volume always expands.
Side dishes: sausages and quail-egg jangjorim…
Even if it was a lunchbox, it was for a first-grade elementary school girl's stomach. No need to go overboard. The shopping trip I'd expected to take multiple runs was done in one.
Two packs of 120g sausages bundled together, plenty of ready-made quail-egg jangjorim already on the shelves. One pack of cherry tomatoes, two bunches of shine muscat grapes—more than enough. All told it came to just under twenty thousand won.
There would be plenty left even after packing the lunchboxes, so for a while breakfast would probably be egg rice made with the instant packs, with sausages and jangjorim on the side.
Right after I finished checking out and left the mart—
Something feels off…
Carrying bags almost too heavy to hold, I felt a vague emptiness and headed straight home. Had I forgotten something?
The front door clicked open—and Siyeon's shoes were gone. Normally there'd be cartoon music drifting from inside the room. Now there was only silence.
"Mari-niiiiim—!"
"What the hell."
"How could you leave me behind!? A monster appeared and Siyeon-nim left on her own!"
Only then did I realize what the emptiness had been. I bolted into the bathroom, unclipped the teddy from the laundry line, and grabbed him. Dampness still clung to the fabric, wetting my hand.
I dumped the grocery bags on the living room floor and rounded on the bear, half interrogation, half pure disbelief.
"And you just let her go, you fucker?!"
"In that state I was in, how exactly was I supposed to stop her!?"
Even for a teddy, the logic was sound enough to shut me up. I spat out a noise that was equal parts irritation, annoyance, and worry.
"Goddammit… Where is she? Spit it out."
"Toward the subway station. There's still residual monster energy."
I raced down the stairs and found a quiet spot that was still close by. Magical girls never transformed at home precisely so no one could pin down their residence. I'd already transformed and flown in from other places plenty of times recently, so launching from this apartment just this once should be fine.
"Sun."
A short, crisp transformation call, then a powerful vertical leap that left a crater in the dirt of the garden behind the building.
Near the mart the monster siren had been almost inaudible. The closer I got to the station the louder it scraped at my ears, making it clear the monster was near. As people finished evacuating the racket died down somewhat. On the way to the fight scene I asked him,
"How long's it been out? The monster."
"About… thirteen minutes now."
Thirteen minutes. Long enough that the fight should already be over.
A world where even elementary schoolers can be magical girls and take down monsters. In other words, the magical girls were overwhelmingly stronger than most monsters—a playing field tilted so far it was practically vertical. And yet residual monster energy remained. The reason was obvious.
"She still hasn't finished it off, huh?"
"Probably. Not every elementary schooler is as… ruthless as you, Sun-nim…"
"What was that?"
The blatant dig soured my mood instantly. I glared at him.
"I mean… not as mature."
In a flash of improvisation he walked back the word and offered a more palatable substitute. Ruthless and mature. In a way, weren't they the same thing? It was still annoying, but not wrong enough to argue. I settled for a skeptical tilt of the head. I still felt like I'd been insulted, though.
As expected, the situation itself was already over. A mid-sized monster that looked like a chicken, frozen solid from head to toe. Not bad for going solo, I thought. I deliberately landed some distance away and walked toward her with heavy footsteps so she'd hear me coming.
Even from fairly close she still hadn't noticed. All I could see was her back, both hands clamped tight around her staff.
"Moon."
"?!"
The moment I set a hand on her shoulder and called her name, she finally whirled around, startled. Breathing hard like she'd just finished a workout, shoulders heaving. Actions that looked frightened, pupils smaller than usual. She'd clearly given it everything she had, but once again I was reminded this was no job for someone her age.
Centered on Siyeon, the road was frozen in a wide fan shape. A giant chicken monster, frozen mid-roar as if taxidermied in place.
"It's okay. It's okay."
Even though she'd completely won, she was still trembling. I wrapped her up from the front and patted her back. At roughly the same eye level I saw the tears beading up like chicken droppings, gave her a little smile, and kept wiping the fresh ones away with my finger, smearing them on my own clothes.
Magical girl or not, Siyeon's heart was still far too soft. This was exactly why I hadn't wanted to send her alone.
"Aww, was it that scary?"
We were almost the same height so calling it a hug was a stretch, but anyway—she just nodded silently against me, answering without words. After I finished wiping the last of her tears I sat her down at a nearby bus stop and told her not to look this way.
"You really die easy, huh. Be grateful it was her and not me."
"……."
The monster was frozen solid, unable to hear or speak. I walked up to it muttering meaningless garbage and gave its shoulder a couple of taps with my staff. Wasn't the "frozen solid" technique still incomplete or something? Part of me wanted to roast the thing into a whole grilled chicken as punishment for making Siyeon cry.
Even so, taking this long was a nuisance to the people who'd evacuated, so I decided to wrap it up fast. Compared to my usual average of five minutes, this was already way late.
"Fucking bastards!"
I gathered power into both arms, leapt, and brought them down. The chicken monster shattered into ice fragments, torso and all. The flesh visible in the broken cross-sections didn't look all that different from a well-muscled free-range chicken.
Could you deep-fry a monster, I wonder?
A Saturday that had started with Siyeon's tears—an uneasy holiday. She even turned off the magical girl anime she loved so much and headed for the bed.
"…Haa."
Watching her, I scratched the back of my head, sinking into a complicated mood. I was going to have to say something. I hadn't planned on laying a hand on someone else's mascot, but—
"Hey, Teddy."
I called the bear urgently. He floated over right in front of me.
"Yes?"
Leaning against the wall near the entrance so Siyeon couldn't hear, I pointed toward the bed.
"Go to Siyeon and tell her monster hunting is always hard, that it's natural to be scared… Just tell her I'm the weird one."
"Ah, yes. Understood."
Teddy drifted off toward the bed. He'd probably trash me enthusiastically with that out-of-line little tongue of his. And then there was Siyeon's mascot, flailing without hands or feet the moment he saw her sniffling on the bed.
"Huu…"
The second I looked at him a long sigh escaped. When you got down to it, he was the culprit who'd sent Siyeon out after a monster before I even got home.
"Hey, Sea Snake."
I spoke the name I'd only been holding in my mind and looked straight at him like I was pointing. Siyeon's mascot glanced my way with a hint of fear.
"S-Sea Snake…?"
"You're coming up to the roof with me."
A thing like that flying around in the open sky would look blatantly wrong, so even as I told him to follow I grabbed him by the whole neck and hauled him out the front door. Clutching the plastic-toy-like thrashing creature I headed for the rooftop.
I opened the unlocked roof door, walked out at a steady pace, leaned my back against the railing, and released him in front of my face. Scratching the back of my head to show my frustration, I asked the question.
"Why did you take her out alone? Let's start with that."
"B-because a monster appeared? Sun wasn't home either…"
An opinion that could only come from a pure mascot's perspective. A monster appeared. Therefore a magical girl must fight.
"You had no idea what was going to show up and you still dragged a kid out alone? Are you insane?"
"B-but Moon has magic power almost equal to yours! She can fight monsters just fine!"
"Hey."
I grabbed the neck of the creature flitting around in front of me again and pressed him down until he touched the floor. The flower-garden expression he'd been wearing a second ago vanished in an instant; his pupils shrank. With a face that held not a shred of humor, I asked again.
"Are you scared right now?"
"……."
The way his eyes darted around showed the fear well enough. Looking at how mascots usually acted, their mental age wasn't all that high either. The ones who were supposed to understand a child's perspective better than anyone were acting like this.
"Siyeon knows the monster fully intends to hurt her."
I needed to make this crystal clear after what had just happened. I kept going, voice full of disbelief.
"You're not even facing a monster—you're just caught in my hand and you're already shaking like a leaf. And you think Siyeon can properly fight a monster when she's all alone?"
"B-but Sun is…"
"I'm not her."
I cut off whatever the sea snake was about to say, jabbing my left index finger into the hollow between my collarbones. Then I transferred that same finger onto his long body and continued.
"The one you need to look at is Siyeon."