Chapter 1: Too Young To Die
Old age. Two deceptively simple words for the most common cause of death in a developed nation, and a complete lie to boot. Oh, it’s possible in theory, according to the modern understanding of aging; evolution did a wonderful job for humanity, but it never quite produced a body that was designed to endure forever, in the fashion of certain strains of jellyfish, lobsters and earthworms. Humans are too complicated, in the end: too many fragile organs, too many moving parts in the engine to run forever. Theoretically, a man could live long enough for the last of their body’s secret sauce to run out, whether that be telomeres or some yet undiscovered component, and for the body to simply stop functioning.
In practice, nobody has come close to that limit in recorded history; when people say someone passed away from old age, what they actually mean is that their elderly, weakened immune system finally succumbed to some form of illness. Heart disease is the most common by far, with cancer a distant second, while lung disease, diabetes and dementia compete fiercely for the last spot on the podium. There are far more possibilities, of course, too many to list here; it really doesn’t take much, such that even the humble flu reaps a fearsome tally with every passing winter. A more suitable phrase for such endings, increasingly adopted in the modern day, is death by natural causes.
With that in mind, what does a death by unnatural causes look like, in a reasonably safe and prosperous land? Overwhelmingly, it involves at least one vehicle, and sometimes more; indeed, the humble car crash remains the leading cause of an early death, far outpacing homicide, drowning, and plane crashes, for all that the latter three command far more attention from the media with each occurrence. A curious collection of facts, to be sure, though why does any of this matter? Truthfully, it doesn’t, but that didn’t stop all of this from flooding my mind with crystalline clarity. What can I say? The human brain does funny things when a girl’s about to die.
To think, the day started off so promising, too, without a single hint as to what was to come. It was the last working day of the month, the denouement of twenty-odd days spent slaving away, a nameless, faceless cog in the corporate wheel of fortune. All of that drudgery, building up to a single glorious moment that made it all almost worthwhile: payday. Sure, half of it vanished in thin air before it ever hit my bank account, and most of what remained would be snapped up by rent and student loans, but I’d been saving what little was left over for the past year and then some; until at last, I could finally afford my first holiday as a supposedly productive member of society. Nothing fancy, certainly nowhere foreign, but a holiday all the same; a wonderful week alone in a nice wooden cottage, sleeping by the fireplace with a book in hand. Even just the thought of it was wonderful, and even leaving the office late after some impromptu overtime couldn’t keep a spring out of my step as I headed for home.
Admittedly, I wasn’t paying much attention to the road in my excitement, far less than was merited at such a late hour; if this were a story with a more otherworldly bent, it would have been the perfect time to cross a busy street and for a date with Truck-kun. This is an urban fantasy though, and I’m not that absent-minded, so I remained safe and sound on the sidewalk where I belonged. Instead, I suffered the indignity of a jump scare as the emergency sirens went off, every single one of them, up and down the street. It was the first time I’d ever heard them in the wild outside of the routine evacuation drills that happened every month on the dot, marked down on every public calendar, just to be thorough. Predictably, I froze in place, doing the exact opposite of what the drills taught me in a bout of skittishness, because the occasional planned drill wasn’t nearly enough to develop the correct response for the real thing, to behave the way a trained soldier would react. That said, it probably wouldn’t have made a difference even if I did try to find some cover, because barely moments after the cacophony started, a car came flying towards me far faster than I could even hope to run, and then I was on the floor.
It didn’t hurt, oddly enough, though it could have just been the shock and adrenaline talking; truth be told, I wasn’t feeling much of anything in the heat of the moment. Laid flat on my back, staring up at the night sky; a grey and silver blur, barely visible through the pollution of the city lights. A floating grey blob slowly rendered overhead, buzzing like the cicadas I used to chase in the yard, back at the old family home over a decade and a continent ago. I finally remembered that my eyes needed to focus to work properly, so I did; it wasn’t an oversized bug after all, but a news helicopter. Still an insect, just of a different sort, the more cynical viewers would say, ground down by a steady diet of twenty-four hour news that had lost any semblance of meaning years ago. The helicopter traced lazy circles overhead, barely skimming over rooftops, the floodlight and camera mounted up front following something just beyond my field of view.
I tried turning my head, morbidly curious as to what was going on; the sirens were still blaring in the background, and I was never one to believe in coincidence. That’s when I found I could only move from the neck up, which let me see the growing pool of red pouring out of my side and onto the pavement. This is it, I thought to myself, this is where I go. Here lies Lily Young, living up to my namesake by dying at the tender age of twenty two, leaving behind a single drawer of clothes and a mountain of student debt. The cold was creeping into my bones by now, as blood loss took its toll, but even here at the precipice, I couldn’t quite find it in me to care. One abortive attempt to call for help, whereupon my throat duly refused to make a sound, and that was it for me. I stopped craning my neck, lay back down, and my vision slowly started to fade at the margins, I could only wonder why.
Presumably, the universe has a funny sense of humour, because that was the exact cue for a reptilian monstrosity to fly overhead, screeching from three mouths: one on its head and two where hands were meant to be, for good measure. I didn’t even need to see the blank white mask and onyx scales to recognise like for like; such a creature could only be a demon, the latest of a long line that had become a permanent, unwelcome fixture in modern life. Nobody knew where they came from, or if they did nobody was talking; they were the barely humanoid face of evil, no two alike but all of them murderous, impossible to reason with and immune to all conventional weaponry, inevitably reaping a fearsome toll each time one appeared until they were stopped by the one force that could.
“Rise, Pillars of Creation!”
A loud, bombastic voice that cut through the din, calling out the name of her attack for all the world to hear. Gaudy and unnecessary? Perhaps, but I couldn’t deny its effectiveness; a blink of an eye was all it took for the earth to rise up, impaling the demon all the way through. The demon’s arms twitched limply unto the end, struggling for strength with each futile movement before finally falling still; vitality spent, what remained of its unnatural body quickly lost cohesion, aging a year with every passing second until only a faint cloud of dust remained, itself quickly carried away by the wind.
“That’s the last of them,” that same voice declared proudly, as the earthen pillar retracted back into the ground, all the while she drifted into view.
Clad in a familiar brown bodysuit and a matching dress, ending in a pair of knee high leather boots, complete with a glowing amber wand in hand and a pointy hat, the new arrival floated down beside me, defying the law of gravity in the unmistakable manner of a magical girl. The entire ensemble fit like a charm, and if that were all, there wouldn’t have been anything to criticise. Sadly, the effect was rather abruptly undercut by all the logos. Sponsorships from local and regional brands both featured, hawking everything from fried chicken shops, to discount cinema tickets and a brand new pair of sneakers; no accommodation had been made whatsoever to conform to her uniform, leaving the end result rather mismatched to say the least. I’d never been comfortable with this, even as a little girl; one of my earliest memories featured me sitting in front of the old TV, asking my mother why all the magical girls on display looked like walking advertisements.If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, it's taken without the author's consent. Report it.
A decade and a degree later, I understood the reality of things; fighting demons might be heroic, but it didn’t exactly come with a wage and benefits package, whereas a magical girl still had to eat. I still didn’t like it though; backseat driver I may be, but I couldn’t help feeling that it was somehow profane, to take something as wonderful as magic, honest-to-god magic, and turn it into a vehicle of commerce. Still, I wasn’t about to raise a complaint, not when said magical girl represented my only chance of survival, in the total absence of alternative medical care.
“Earthwarder,” I tried to call out to the resident heroine, emphasis on trying, as my throat still stubbornly refused to cooperate.
It was enough to get her attention at least, her head tilting at an angle that by all means should have knocked the hat right off of her head; another point in favour of magical tailoring, I suppose.
“You’re still alive?” She raised an eyebrow, springing into action to point her amber wand down directly at me.
Unable to reply, I could only gurgle, hanging on for dear life until the wave of healing magic arrived to put me back together. I knew it was possible; I’d seen enough news reports of similar feats to know that magic could heal anything short of death (and even that was subject to rumours of dubious authenticity).
“Your right side is basically gone. Half the ribs are powder, your right lung and liver are torn to shreds, hell, even your spinal cord got cut in half.”
That explained the paralysis, I thought to myself, as I waited for the diagnostics to finish and the treatment to begin. I’d never gotten magical healing before, so I wasn’t sure what it entailed; what I certainly didn’t expect was for Earthwarder to pull out her phone and start browsing.
“Damn, another incursion already, just north of here?”
She was already floating back up by the time she pocketed her phone, her attention turning towards the new threat, far off in the distance.
“I’m not much of a healer, so I can’t fix you up without draining myself, and I need that magic to keep fighting. If it’s any consolation, it should be painless until you pass. Sorry.”
With that, Earthwarder floated away, brushing me aside like a bug and leaving me to die. Even were I physically capable of it, I doubt I’d have had any words at the time, my mind reeling at the sudden reversal of fortune. I’d never been much of an optimist, even before the reality of the workforce sapped what little remained and replaced it with cold hard apathy, but even I still held magical girls to a certain pedestal. Corporate sponsorships aside, they were still icons of justice, humanity’s first and final line of defence against the Great Enemy. To be tossed aside on the brink of death by such a protector, swept away like trash, I simply didn’t know what to feel, which made me realise with a start that I was able to feel again.
Everything from the initial car crash up until this point, I'd experienced through the lens of a strange detachment that could only be explained by my impending demise. Now, all of a sudden, my emotions came rushing back with a vengeance. Fear of the unknown, of death, as comes naturally to almost every human being. Sadness, that I was seen as so worthless, not even equivalent to the magic it would take to put me back together, however that was counted. But most of all, a torrential raging anger that my life would be snuffed out so easily, nothing more than a hapless victim of coincidence.
I tried to get up again, and found no more success than before; anger was powerful, but not to the degree that it could override the laws of physics. All I managed to do was spill more of myself onto the pavement as the night sky grew dim, my blood loss finally reaching a critical point. Cold, it was so very cold now, and in the end, all that was left to do was close my eyes and wait for it to end.
"What if it didn't have to end like this?"
Great, I thought to myself, I'm starting to hallucinate. It was something known to happen close to death, but I'd thankfully been spared that indignity up until this point. Can't you just let me die in peace?
“I could, but that would be doing both of us a grave disservice.”
A soft paw rubbed against my cheek, startling me into opening my eyes again, only to find that I was no longer quite so alone.
It was floating just inches above my head: blue and rotund, distinguishable from a ball only thanks to a pair of gleaming amber eyes and a mouth far too wide for its small body, complete with a patented cheshire grin. A British Shorthair cat, the most popular pedigreed breed in England for fifty years running, with the receipts to prove it. Their appeal cut through generations, thanks to a distinctive appearance resembling real life teddy bears, while their gentle demeanour and generally low maintenance made them excellent pets for busy workers and children alike. My boss had one, a giant of a tomcat that never left his office, just like his owner, and I’d seen many more online; influencers simply adored them. Granted, none of those cats knew how to float in the air, or at least refrained from it while within human sight. Maybe they only showed themselves to the dying, like the old urban myths about cats comforting the old men and women in hospice care?
“Do you wish to live? If so, make a contract with me and become a magical girl!”
Never mind, this was something else entirely, I decided; either that, or my hallucinations were considerably more realistic than anticipated, if they could feature touch-sensitive, floating and talking cats. Unlike some of my co-workers, I was a straight-laced young employee and always steered clear of drink and drugs; they were typically far out of my price range, the calling card of trust fund babies working their first job before taking the inevitable golden parachute onward to bigger and better things. More likely than not, this encounter was real. Mascots were something of a known quantity: mysterious beings that appeared to the lucky few in time of need, offering magical powers that set them apart from humanity at large. The cat wasn’t one I recognised, which meant little; I was hardly a magical girl fanatic, and even hardcore fans wouldn’t recognise all of them, as many mascots kept a low profile, letting their magical girl hog the spotlight.
“What’s the catch?” I tried to reply, emphasis on tried.
It came out less like speech and more the rattling gasp of the damned; a natural consequence of a lack of teeth, tongue or throat.
“There are certain obligations inherent to your new station in life, some negotiable and others ironclad, but it’s either that or the afterlife. I’d go over the full list of terms and conditions with you, but I’m afraid you simply don’t have that much time left.”
The mascot still got the point though, so either there was magic involved or my question was pretty obvious, given the circumstances. That didn’t leave me much to go on, and part of me resented the idea of owing some unspecified favour in exchange for my life. The other, much larger part of me just didn’t want to die. In a way the choice was easy; there was no time for hesitation or doubt, to agonise and overthink as I often did.
I accept.
I didn’t even try to speak aloud this time, some long buried instinct telling me that it wouldn’t matter, my will was my word and intent was all that truly mattered in moments like this. Two simple words to overturn my understanding of the world, to change everything. It hurt, as change often did; whatever was keeping the pain at bay until now no longer up to the task, or perhaps it was simply the final straw, a fresh onslaught to break the camel’s back. Then I was screaming, and in no shape to pay attention to the details. I could feel in broad strokes what was happening; feel my tattered flesh knit back together and old blood seep into my veins, taking full advantage of my new lease on life.
“Oh dear, that mana surge is going to attract some attention. Best to get you out of here before they arrive.”
The world lurched, the ground falling out from under me as my agony steadily intensified despite my body inching towards recovery, and then I knew only darkness.