Since I've started work on MISSY FOXGLOVE again, and am nearly
ready to post part of episode 2, I've decided to repost the first episode
for those who haven't read it.
	This is a cross between a Magical Girl storyline and a Yakuza one.
In its own peculiar way, it's a Sailor Moon Anti-fic, in that it had its
genesis in my having seen Sailor Moon and disliked it.  After an extended
discussion with some of the more rational SM fans (in which I changed no
minds) the idea of a magic girl with the power to kill other magic girls
came to my mind.  I ignored it, but it stayed there, and began to take on a
certain power.
	It took me a long time to write this much, and nearly as long to
get started on the second part, but it's never let me go.  It comes slowly
(and I am a slow writer, even at the best of times) for two reasons.
First, it is important to me, and I want to use my best, most thoughtful
prose and to avoid pat solutions or easy answers (or self-indulgence), and
second, it's painful to write.  I've become very fond of Michie (she is,
after all, part of me) and I would love to have someone swoop down and
carry her off, then come back and machine-gun Tsunishi and Sato and the
entire sordid bunch.  But that would be a cheat and a lie, and would tear
out any meaning I had managed to put in the story.  Michie must face her
darkness on her own, and her answers won't come easily, if at all.  When I
write her story, I feel like I'm wandering the waste lands with her, trying
to get some shelter from the dead tree.

	This post has been split into two parts.  I will have some of the
next episode posted in a few days.


-->>

	Tsuneishi Toshiro, head of the most powerful crime family in Japan,
tugged at his collar and sweated.  Despite protests from other _Yakuza_
families, he had made extensive connections with various criminal
organizations around the world.  The Russian mob, the Black Hand of Sicily,
South American cartels -- he had extended promises, made deals, laundered
money, and accepted merchandise.  The other families had been coming
around, and had grudgingly accepted his leadership, when things had begun
to go wrong.  Embarrassingly wrong.
	Vasily Andreovitch Cherenkov, a sweaty white walrus of a man,
leaned across the mahogany table and fixed Tsuneishi with a glassy eye.
The representatives from the other mobs were clearly enjoying Tsuneishi's
discomfort.  <<Like wild dogs,>> Tsuneishi thought, <<ready to eat
whichever one falls.>>
	"I'm sorry, Cherenkov-san," said Tsuneishi, using the honorific out
of pure habit.  "I assure you that you will receive the money you are owed
very soon.  We have had... difficulties.  They will soon be overcome.  I
can only ask you to be patient."
	"What 'difficulties?'" growled the fat Russian.  "You didn't lose
all my money playing patty-chinky, did you, Toshi?"
	Tsuneishi bowed his head to hide an angry flush.  Much as he wanted
to slice the fat man's head from his shoulders, he was no position to do
anything but swallow the insult.  <<Always the samurai are at the mercy of
the moneylenders.>>  "No, Cherenkov-san," he said.  "We have had legitimate
business difficulties which make it impossible to repay our debt to you.
But we are currently taking steps to correct the situation, and I give you
my personal assurance that you will be repaid in due time, with proper
interest."
	Cherenkov snorted.  "I don't want your assurances, Toshi, and I'm
tired of listening to your bullshit.  I want my fucking money, and if you
don't stop your bobbing and weaving and give me a straight answer, I will
personally cut off your pisser and shove it down your throat.  Am I clear
on this?  Now, what "situation" are you in?"
	"Someone is... interfering... with our operation."
	"Who?"
	Tsuneishi hesitated.  "Spit it out, Toshi," snapped Cherenkov.
	"Mmmerjeggul," mumbled Tsuneishi.
	"I can't hear you."
	"Magic girls," said Tsuneishi, louder than he intended.  "Pretty
little magic girls with rainbow hair.  They burn our money, destroy our
warehouses, and turn our best crystal meth into pink sugar candy.  With
ribbons.  And they giggle, and... and we can't stop them.  Not with dogs,
not with guards, not with guns.  We... we don't know what to do."
	Laughter swelled up and filled the room as Tsuneishi flushed again.

After the meeting, Tsuneishi met with his lieutenant, Sato, a slim man in
his late thirties, who wore rimless glasses and a neutral expression.
"Sato-kun," he said,"I want these syrupy little children out of my hair.  I
don't care how you do it, I want them gone.  Wiped out.  Eliminated.  You
can have whatever you need; I just don't want to see or hear of another one
of them.
	"That could be a difficult course of action." said Sato
	"It's your fault that I'm in this situation, anyway.  You were the
one who told me to make that deal."  Tsuneishi pushed his fingers through
his thinning hair.  He was terrified of looking weak, and knew that younger
men were anxious to move up.  It wasn't like the old days, where you picked
an _oyabun_, or mentor, and stuck with him until he retired -- or died.
Now, the young pups would bite the pack leader if he didn't move out of
their way.  "Give me a solution, Sato-kun.  I won't just sit in this trap."
	"I may have one, Tsuneishi-san.  The girls are interfering, yes,
but that's not where our true difficulty lies."
	"They don't make _yakuza_ movies anymore.  They hate us now."
	"Sir?"
	"I'm sorry. Go on."
	"Yes, sir.  The problem is that we cannot respond effectively to
their actions.  We have no magical girls of our own.
	Tsuneishi frowned.  "So what are you saying?"
	"Tsuneishi-san, we have a magic girl gap."

				  *   *   *

				MISSY FOXGLOVE
				      By
				David Homerick.

				  Episode #1
				    "Pilot"

				  *   *   *

	Sato stepped past the guards into the conference room and bowed
deeply as the doors swung closed behind him.  Tsuneishi eyed him crossly.
Sato couldn't have arranged this in just a few days; he must have been
hiding it for months.  Keeping secrets.  <<Thinks he's so smart.  Just run
things on his own, never mind me.  Well, I won't let him.  I'm not ready to
be put out to pasture yet.>>
	"Well, Sato-kun, what have you got for me?"
	"Sato gestured to the guards, who swung the doors open again.
"Tsuneishi-san, please allow me to present the magical girl Missy Foxglove."
	Tsuneishi watched critically as the girl entered.  She was slender
and pretty, maybe fourteen or so, just blossoming into young womanhood.
She bowed deeply and straightened, hands folded, eyes cast down.  Her long
hair, bound back with a black velvet ribbon, marked her as a magical girl,
being a deep bruised shade of purple.  She wore the traditional Japanese
schoolgirl costume, a modestly cut skirt and middy blouse, but black
trimmed with the same deep orchid as her hair.  She also wore purple pumps,
about two inches at the heel and tied to her ankles with black ribbon.
<<Young men will be killing themselves over her in a few years,>> thought
Tsuneishi.  He gestured to one of the guards, who stepped forward.
	"When I give the word," he said, "I want you to kill this young girl."
	The girl glanced up, shocked, then back down.  Her eyes were set
wide and colored the same dark shade as her hair.  She remained silent, but
Tsuneishi saw her turn slightly and roll an eye back towards the guard.  He
leaned forward.
	"You'll have to kill this man before he can kill you," he said,
"But I don't want you to move until I give him the word."  The girl didn't
answer, but raised herself on her toes so that the heels of her shoes no
longer touched the ground.  Her eye rolled toward the guard again.  The
guard, for his part, unfastened his sidearm and prepared to draw it.
	 Tsuneishi savored the moment.  The girl rocked to the left and
slowly slid the toe of her right foot back and to the side, while the guard
crouched and twisted slightly.  Sato, on the other hand, remained
infuriatingly calm.  Tsuneishi raised his hand and rapped the table sharply.
	"Now!" he barked.  The guard drew as the girl whirled, hands wide,
fingers curled like claws.  A faint violet streamer of glowing haze
stretched between her hands and sent a tendril snaking forward, forking at
the end.  One tip brushed the guard's wrist while the other caressed his
chest.  The gun flew from nerveless fingers as the guard collapsed,
gasping, face pale and coated with cold sweat.  The tendril withdrew, and
the girl turned to Tsuneishi questioningly.  Tsuneishi nodded to her.
	Still the girl hesitated, and he saw her flick a glance at Sato.
"Finish him," snapped Tsuneishi.
	The girl sent the streamer plunging into the guard's heart.  The
guard groaned and twitched and then lay still.  His breathing faded as the
haze withdrew, curled around the girl's hands, and vanished.  She stepped
back, turned, and bowed again, this time staying down, hiding her face.
	"Thank you, Missy-chan," said Tsuneishi, "you may go now."  The
girl glanced back at the body as she was led from the room.  Tsuneishi
gestured for his lieutenant to come closer.
	"She's quick," he said, "and very deadly.  But can she take down
another little magic girl?"
	Sato hesitated.  "I don't know, Tsuneishi-san.  I believe she can,
but she's never actually fought one.  She did well in her training, as you
saw."
	"Won't the shoes be a problem?  They're pretty, but they don't look
practical."
	"She's not wearing a costume.  The shoes and the clothes appear to
be part of who she is.  They spontaneously modified themselves several
times during her training, as did her powers.  If you want her to wear
sensible shoes, you should probably send her to a psychiatrist."
	Tsuneishi nodded, eyes narrowed thoughtfully.  "Modified
themselves, hm?  What about her?  Is she reliable?"
	Sato nodded.  "Oh, yes, sir.  Missy's a good girl.  She's very
loyal, and she always does as she's told."

	Toguri Junior High School in Maebashi is a squat, ugly concrete
building built just after World War II with the curious property of seeming
dirty no matter how diligently it is scrubbed.  The dusty film of neglect
coating the building turns out, on closer inspection, to be the paint job,
and the halls are paved with sad, yellowish tiles that may once have
aspired to being off-white, but have sunk into dissolution and dinge as the
years passed.  Nonetheless, the building is indeed scrubbed, quite
diligently, by an army of students pressganged into service every Friday.
They are released from class an hour early and fan through the school
building wielding buckets and brooms and mops and sponges.  They sweep and
scrape and wash and wipe, and though the building never rises above its
state of dingy disrepair, it does manage to achieve a distinctly antiseptic
form of dingy disrepair.
	On one such Friday, the door to the boys' restroom in the lower
south hall swung slowly open and a girl with short-cropped hair peered
nervously in.  "Cleaning time!" she sang, stifling a giggle.  "Here I come,
ready or not!"  Receiving no reply, she thrust the door open and slipped
into the room, lugging a yellow plastic pail containing sponges and
disinfectant spray.  The door swung back and thumped her companion, who was
attempting to wheel a mop and bucket into the room by pushing on the mop
handle.
	"Oh, wow, we're in the *boys' bathroom*," the girl said in an
excited whisper as her companion extricated herself from the doorway.  "I
betcha we're not s'posed to be here.  I betcha it's a mistake, and there
are boys cleaning up a girls' restroom somewhere."  She dropped the pail
and walked up to the row of urinals.  "These are where the boys pee," she
whispered theatrically.  "I've heard about these things, but I've never
seen one."
	The other girl threw her a puzzled look.  She didn't notice.  "They
stand here with their things out and-- Eeew!"  She squealed and darted back
to press herself against a sink.  "I don't wanna touch 'em!"
	Her companion, a slightly taller girl with long dark hair bound
back with a black ribbon, shrugged resignedly and took a sponge and a
disinfectant bottle from the pail.  She wet the sponge and began cleaning
the leftmost urinal, spraying with her right hand and wiping with her left.
The short-haired girl watched in dismay.
	"I didn't say I wouldn't help!"  She hurriedly plucked out a sponge
and bottle and set to work on the rightmost urinal.  "There!  Now that's
twice the work, and we'll be done in half the time.  You're new here,
right?  Where are you from?  Do you have a boyfriend?  You're really
beautiful; I'll bet you had lots of boyfriends back where you come from.  I
have a boyfriend; his name's Yoshio.  He's really cute.  We watch _Ekksu
Firu_ together.  Do you watch _Ekksu Firu_?  That's a really scary show; I
like to be scared.  You sure don't talk much.  Oh!  I forgot to introduce
myself!  I'm Kosugi Chisa."  She stood, gave a short bow, and beamed at the
other girl.
	The other girl stood as well, and bowed.  "I'm Nakasone Michie,"
she said quietly.  "I'm from Tokyo, and I -- I'm afraid I've forgotten all
your other questions."
	"Me too!" said Chisa.  "You have a really pretty voice, too.  Will
you be my friend?  I already have a friend, but if you'll be my friend too,
then I'll have two friends.  And then you can be my friend's friend, and
you'll have two friends too.  So will you be my friend, please?  I'll be
quiet so you can say yes."
	"I guess so," said Michie, a little overwhelmed.  She gave the
urinal a final wipe, then flushed it.  She watched her reflection on the
porcelain shimmer as the water came down.  "You're not -- you wouldn't
happen to be a magic girl, would you?"
	"Oh, I wish I were!" squealed Chisa.  "They're so pretty, and they
always fight for Love and Justice and stuff like that.  Yoshio says I'm
cute enough to be a magic girl, but he's my boyfriend, and he has to say
stuff like that or I won't kiss him.  Don't you wish you were a magic girl?
I know I do."
	"I used to.  Sometimes."  Michie moved to the next urinal and
sprayed it with disinfectant.
	"Will you still be my friend, Michie-chan?" Chisa asked anxiously.
"Even if I'm not a magic girl?"
	"Sure."  Michie reached over and hugged Chisa, who giggled,
dropping her sponge.

	After school let out, Chisa introduced Michie to her friend, a
rangy girl named Naoko.  They walked along the street together as Chisa
chattered.  "She's really smart, and she goes to a cram school, so she
can't come home with us.  Say something smart, Naoko-chan."
	Naoko rolled her eyes.  "Mandibular."
	"Isn't she great?  She knows all kinds of words, and can write
them, too.  *You* don't go to a cram school, do you, Michie-chan?"
	Michie shook her head.  "That's great!" exclaimed Chisa.  "You
didn't look really smart, so I was hoping we could hang around while..."
	"Chisa-chan!" gasped Naoko.  "You've insulted her!"
	"Oh!" cried Chisa.  "I'm sorry!  I didn't mean you were stupid!  I
just meant that since you're pretty and Naoko isn't..."
	"Chisa-chan!  You've insulted *me*!"
	"I'm sorry, Naoko-chan!  Please don't be mad!  You don't be mad
either, Michie-chan!  Oh, when will I learn to keep my big mouth shut?"
	"When you're dead," snorted Naoko.
	A shadow passed over Michie's face, and she turned to hide it.
<<He died so quickly,>> she thought.  <<And it was so easy, like turning
off a faucet.  I touched his heart, and he died.  So... so intimate.>>
	<<I can kill anyone that way.  I can kill Chisa.  A few seconds to
transform, a few more to touch her, and she'll be quivering and dying on
the ground.>>  She swallowed and wiped at her mouth.  <<I can kill her
right now, and she'll never talk or laugh again.  Never ever.  And they'll
never catch me, because I'll kill anyone who comes for me.  I'll kill
everyone in the world.>>
	<<And then,>> she thought giddily, <<I'll be all alone....>>
	A hand clamped firmly over Michie's mouth and nose.  "You're
hyperventilating," Naoko said sharply.  "Keep that up and you'll pass out."
	"I'm sorry!" said Chisa, near tears.  "I didn't mean to make you
sick!  Please say you forgive me!  Oh pleasepleasepleaseplease...."
	Michie pushed Naoko's hand away.  "It wasn't your fault. I was just
thinking about... about something bad."
	Naoko raised her eyebrows, but Chisa was ecstatic.  "You really
mean it?  It's okay?  It's really okay?  You'll still come home with me?"
	Michie smiled at her reassuringly.  "It's really okay, Chisa-chan.
You're sure your mother won't mind?"  Michie's mother would have raised
three kinds of hell if Michie had ever shown up with an unannounced guest.
	"Oh, sure!" said Chisa.  "My mom's totally non-feudal.  You'll see."
	Naoko stopped.  "I have to go, or I'll be late.  You sure you're
okay, Michie-chan?"
	"I'm fine, thank you."
	"Well, breathe normally, okay?  If you pass out in front of Chisa,
you'll probably scare her to death."
	Michie winced.  "I'll be careful. Thank you again."
	Chisa tugged at Michie as Naoko walked off.  "I *told* you she was
smart.  Come on, we'll be late for dinner."

	Chisa and her family lived in a small brown house in the western
style.  As the two girls entered the house, Chisa kicked off her shoes and
dashed into the kitchen, blithely announcing that her new friend would be
staying for dinner, and did Mama have to make THAT again; after all, Michie
was from Tokyo and used to the most marvelous food.  Michie placed her
shoes in a corner of the entryway and, after a moment thought, Chisa's as
well.  She walked over and peered into the kitchen.
	Mrs. Kosugi was calmly measuring out more rice as her daughter
bounced around her.  Chisa dashed over, seized Michie's hand, and towed her
over to her mother.  Mrs. Kosugi greeted Michie while putting the rice on
to boil.  Michie bowed and apologized for imposing on the family.  Mrs.
Kosugi, in turn, apologized for her daughter's behavior, much to the
indignation of said daughter.  Chisa grabbed Michie by the hand and towed
her back out of the kitchen.  "Let's go to my room," she said.
	Chisa's room was pink and cozy, full of stuffed animals and an
actual four-poster bed.  Michie perched on the soft down comforter as Chisa
introduced her to the entire menagerie, one by one.  There was Sazuko, and
Hattori-san, and Usagi No Gisagu, and a huge panda named Chan-chan, and
Mizuko the furry blue dolphin, and many more, giraffes and piglets and
something Michie tentatively identified as a wombat but Chisa referred to
only as "Toshi."  Michie saw very few dolls, and those were rag dolls, not
the kind of doll-baby she used to cuddle and bathe and nurse back to health
in another life long ago.
	Chisa finished her recital and plopped down beside Michie.  "I got
a lot of them," she said.  "I wanted to be a veterinarian someday, but I
guess I'll just be a wife.  How many animals do you have, Michie-chan?"
	"I don't have any."  Her apartment had been furnished as if she
were a woman in her twenties.  "I don't have much in the way of toys."
	"Oh, you can have mine!"  She picked up a floppy dog, a round black
piglet, and a kangaroo with the pouch torn off, frowned at each in turn,
and discarded them.  She cast about the room, then reluctantly picked up
Chan-chan.  Her hands shook a little as she held it out to Michie.  "Here,"
she said.  "He's the best one.
	Somebody had been chewing on its ears.  "I can't take your favorite
toy," protested Michie.
	"Please," said Chisa.  She thrust it at Michie again.
	Michie accepted the big panda as Chisa watched anxiously.  She
hugged it and smiled at Chisa to prove she liked the worn toy.  Chisa
smiled back.  "He's really great when you're lonely, 'cause he's always
there, and he won't laugh at you or anything.  And if you're feeling bad
and want a hug, he doesn't mind."  She looked pensively at Chan-chan, then
turned to show Michie her music collection.
	  When dinner was ready, Michie met Chisa's brother and father.
Her brother was about a year older than Michie and made her uncomfortable.
He made strange jokes and laughed too hard, and he kept watching her.
Michie tried not to react when Chisa whispered that her father was a police
inspector.  Chisa's father seemed jovial, if a bit distracted, and Michie
found herself imagining all the terrible things that must be on his mind.
	Michie couldn't bring herself to eat naturally, so she held the
bowl in her left hand like the rest of the family and tried not to be
clumsy with the chopsticks.  She felt very self-conscious and couldn't
enjoy the food, especially with Chisa's brother staring at her.  She
concentrated on moving vegetables from platter to bowl to mouth.
	The phone rang, and she dropped one in her lap.  She shot a swift
glare at Chisa's brother, who flushed and hid his face.   Chisa's mother
answered the phone, and announced that it was for Michie.
	"Hello?"
	"Ah, Hello."  It was Sato.  "I hope you are enjoying dinner with
your new friend."
	"Yes," said Michie.  "Her father is a police inspector," she felt
compelled to add.
	"Is he now?  That's a worthy profession.  A package came for you in
the mail today."
	The room grew cold.  "I see."
	"You should look at it when you get a chance."
	"I will."  Sato rung off.
	"That was my guardian," Michie told Chisa.  It was nearly true.  "I
have to go home soon."
	"You don't have parents?"
	"No," said Michie.  "They... died.  In a fire."
	Chisa and her parents expressed condolences while her brother
choked on a mushroom.

	The sun shone redly through a window as Michie opened the door to
her apartment.  Sato's "package," an unlabelled manila envelope, had been
placed squarely on the low glass table.  Michie placed Chan-chan in a
corner and drew the blinds.
	The package contained a photo, a map of Tokyo with tick marks
clustered in one district, a round-trip train ticket to that district, and
a note.  "3:15 PM," it said.  "Dial Tokyo 6-7071."
	The photo was sharp but badly framed, an action shot of a slight
girl in schoolgirl attire, white trimmed with red, and wearing short black
boots.  Her hair was red too, not a Caucasian red but a candy-apple or
jellybean red, and tied in a long French braid.  Her skirt was so short,
Michie noted disapprovingly, that her underthings were visible.  One hand
was flung out before her, and some black substance issued from it, passing
out of frame.  Michie turned the photo over and found a word scrawled on
the back: LICORICE.
	So.  Tomorrow she would travel to Tokyo and receive instructions on
how to kill this Licorice, this magical girl.  She stepped into the small
private bath, stood before the mirror, and made the peculiar mental shift
from Nakasone Michie to Missy Foxglove.  A purplish fog passed before her
eyes as her clothing altered against her skin.  She held the photo up to
the mirror and compared the girl to her technicolor self.  Purple and red,
black and white.  Hunter and hunted.  But the eyes of the girl in the photo
held exhilaration and wonder, and the purple eyes in the mirror held only
dread.
	Michie did not sleep well that night.

	Saturdays were half-days, with light classwork, but Michie still
could not concentrate.  The _kanji_ she had studied all week mocked her
with their meaningless shapes, or twisted themselves into likenesses of the
girl in the photo.  She stared at historical events and the dates on which
they happened and could not convince herself that there was even such a
thing as the past.  Surely it had all happened yesterday, the Meiji
Restoration and the bombing of Hiroshima and her dinner with Chisa.  She
could not even throw the ball properly; her pitches floated unnaturally or
dropped without warning.
	Then the day was over, and she was walking home affectlessly.  She
heard a pattering of feet behind her.
	"Michie-chan!"  It was Chisa.  "Are you mad at me?  Did I do
something wrong?  I'm sorry!  I won't do it again.  What did I do?"
	"What?"
	 "You walked right by me in the hall!  I called your name, but you
wouldn't answer.  You wouldn't even look at me!"
	"It's not your fault.  I'm sorry.  Um."  Michie racked her brain
for something to tell Chisa.  "I've been kind of... preoccupied."
	"Oh.  So... you're not mad at me?"
	Michie shook her head.  "No.  Chisa-chan, I... I have to go."
	"You do?  But it's Saturday!  I thought we could hang out and...
and do stuff."
	"No, Chisa-chan.  I have to go to Tokyo.  I have errands to run."
	"Oh."  Chisa slumped dejectedly.  "But we're still friends, right?
You don't... not like me?"
	Michie shook her head again.  "No.  I mean, that's not it.  I'm
just not in a good place in my life right now."  She bit back an urge to
giggle hysterically.  <<I'm in an evil place in my life.  I'm in my
killing-people phase.>>  "Thank you for being my friend," she blurted, "but
I have to go."  She turned and fled down the street.

****

Continued in a separate message.

-- David