Mahou Madness!

[Mahou-Shoujo]

Lucas did manage to catch it! Tackling the chimera as it reached the fortunately empty gym, he prepared to throw a hit but was struck by a sudden blade of light from the chimera, actually managing to damage him through the magical defenses, drawing a small amount of blood.
"Hah... Leave..."
The chimera... Spoke... That was not normal, some made vaguely human like sounds but not straight up words!

"Hahh?! Umm... Namiko?! Is that normal?!"
Lucas asked, struggling to recover from the hit and barely dodging a second blast of light as the chimera formed a glowing, shimmery sword of light, seeming to barely be there, a chimera forming a weapon was another new thing, they had quite a lot to tell command...

 

[twinkletide]

Namiko burst into the gym just in time to see Lucas stabbed by a blade of light; much of which was absorbed by his defenses, but pierced through, drawing a spot of blood. That wasn't what made Namiko gape though; it was the chimera speaking, speaking coherent Japanese as it attacked. But...leave? No way. Not now. "No!" she shouted back. "But now's not the time to think about that!"

Namiko got over her surprise, filing that new bit of info away for later. Lucas was in trouble, dodging and weaving through bursts of light as it formed what looked to be a sword. Namiko pulled out an M249 LMG in response. "No you don't," she muttered, and without further ado loosed a roaring stream of rounds at the chimera as she jumped into the bleachers.

 

[Mahou-Shoujo]

In any other situation that burst would have torn the chimera apart, since it even seemed shocked by the sudden torrent of firepower heading towards it, barely managing to avoid the first few seconds of fire by blasting energy towards Namiko, destroying some of the bullets and hopefully messing up her aim... Only to be punched again by Lucas... He was getting better at this whole fighting thing.

Just when it seemed they might have an advantage, a blast of darkness was flung at Namiko as the chimera from before ran through the door that lead outside... There were TWO of them now?! And the shadowy one moved to cover the other... This was another thing that didn't happen, chimera would work together but never to this extent.
"Know... You..."
Now that second one was talking.

 

[twinkletide]

Namiko was so focused on shooting and so un-focused on everything else that she almost missed the blast of darkness hurtling towards her. She broke away at the last second as the blast tore at the steel seats of the bleachers. Her eyes locked onto the new threat.

That...that chimera...was it the one from yesterday? Her eyes narrowed at the pair. "Yes," she said coldly. "We know you too. So perhaps it would be prudent to surrender." Her tense stance made it clear that she didn't believe in those words. Really, who would've thought she'd see the day where she'd be speaking to a chimera? Only insane magical girls did that, and were soon after torn apart 90% of the time.

 

[Mahou-Shoujo]

"Uhh... Why are they talking?... And why are they so tough? Can we win?"
Lucas asked, holding back from attacking, getting anywhere near them while the two chimera were right next to each other was simply suicide, hell, last time Lucas attacked the shadowy one he ended up taking more damage than he dealt... And that was with the element of surprise.

Fortunately he didn't need to come up with a plan, as the two chimera decided to charge, the shadowy one blasting at Lucas with waves of energy that he simply couldn't dodge, instead needing to try and simply minimize damage, meanwhile the sword wielding chimera sprinted towards Namiko, firing white energy from the sword in an attempt to keep Namiko from getting a clear target or firing anything heavy.

 

[twinkletide]

That's a good question, Namiko thought after Lucas's query. I'll have to get back to you on that. They spent a few moments in a tense standoff. Namiko's leg muscles strained underneath her. She watched, waiting.

She didn't have to wait long. In the span of a single second the gym exploded into a cage of entropy. On the main floor she saw Lucas dodging waves of darkened energy, each one grazing him as he moved. Namiko would've helped if it weren't for the white one bum-rushed her with its sword, firing volleys at her as it encroached. In an instant Namiko engaged in her own brand of fight-or-flight, firing burst after burst in its general direction as she dodged shots from every angle. Unfortunately many of the shots missed or otherwise glanced off their target due to her frantic movement.

Damn... she thought. I'm not getting anywhere with this. Her eyes drifted back over to Lucas, who was still struggling. Guess I'll have to get closer. Generally close-range wasn't her preferred mode of battle - it was significantly more conducive to random chance, and significantly less so to strategy - but even she had to admit that if you were going to find a winner quick, you'd best do it face-to-face. Discarding her LMG for a double barreled shotgun, Namiko sighed and burst forwards through the chaos, her brain firing on all cylinders to keep her away from each shot as it came. Left, right, up. Fall. Up down left left right. Slow fast. Wait. Go.

 

[Mahou-Shoujo]

As fast as she moved the chimera was able to match her, taking hits but simply shrugging them off, seemingly having little if any sense of pain, and absolutely no fear as it managed to land a few glancing blows, this was a battle of attrition now and it seemed the enemy was winning.
Lucas was barely standing a chance, each punch was easily deflected or turned around against him, not to mention he kept needing to break free from restricting shadow bonds that came out of nowhere to trip him or or hold him still.

Soon the chimera seemed to find an opening, and thrust forwards, impaling Namiko with it's sword, for a normal human this would be the end, no hope of recovery, but for a magical girl? This was easily survivable, not that it wouldn't hurt like hell and cost a huge amount of power to heal, but on the plus side at least the enemy was at point blank range, no way to dodge shot up close!

 

[twinkletide]

Namiko peered down at the sword lodged in her body. She felt nothing, at least then. Too much adrenaline for that. She'd feel it later, assuming she was still alive.

Well. There was a silver lining to it. 12 gauge, point blank. 100% chance of hitting.

With all of her strength, fighting against the blade pushing her back, she surged forward and tackled it to the ground. The sword went further through, her body, forcing blood out of her mouth in strangled coughs; but she continually bashed the chimera's face as hard as she could with the front of the shotgun's barrels, trying to get an opening into its mouth. She would leave nothing to chance. Eventually she pried its jaw open like a crowbar, and, barrel facing upwards in its maw, she yanked the trigger of both barrels.

 

[Mahou-Shoujo]

The chimera was difficult to pin down, but with strength born of pure adrenaline, Namiko pinned it down, firing right into it's mouth... And shockingly... The head stayed intact... That effect, it was similar to the defensive barriers of a magical girl... She dealt enough damage to have clearly hurt it but nothing lethal...

The chimera suddenly sent a burst of energy through the blade, throwing Namiko off of it as it started to stumble towards where Lucas was starting to lose more clearly... Meanwhile Namiko's blood loss was unfortunately making her quite a bit dizzy and weak, and her power was low after channeling itself to heal and protect.
Just as it seemed like Lucas was about to be overrun a flash of rainbow energy similar to Lucas's transformation lit up the gym, did he transform back?... No, he had pulled a sword from the air and landed a hit on the shadow chimera!

 

[twinkletide]

As Namiko reposed on the ground, bleeding, she drily noted how death felt much like starvation. Which is to say it wasn't bad. It was a light and floaty feeling, the feeling of a burden being lifted, of a soul unencumbered by corporeality. The only regret she had was that she failed Lucas. As she watched the two converge on him she felt a tinge of sadness, deep and needling.

What happened next nobody could've expected. Initially she thought that rainbow burst of light was coming to take her away; but when out of it came Lucas, a sword in hand and swinging for the hills, reality came screeching back.

She gasped. No. They still had a chance. Lucas, Lucas! He awakened! The fully conscious part of her rejoiced at the veritable deus ex machina that presented itself. There was no time to waste. Still on the floor, Namiko painfully leaned up and with great difficulty pulled out Roanoke and fired, best as she could, relying on Lucas's element of surprise to catch them off guard.

 

[Mahou-Shoujo]

Despite the sudden awakening giving Lucas new confidence and visibly surprising the two chimera, he was quickly on the defensive again, sure he could do damage, but it was impossible to out fight two chimera with a weapon he had just now started using for the first time ever... Especially when he wasn't that skilled to begin with... Not to mention all the wounds!

Still though... He kept them busy enough that Namiko managed a sneak attack, blasting a hole right through the shadowy chimera and knocking the other back a bit... This seemed to change something in their plan and the two wounded chimera decided to run! Throwing a massive expanding barrier of shadows behind them as a shield and distraction, it wouldn't be enough to do any damage, but would certainly throw off any pursuit... And indeed, when it cleared the chimera were gone... Lucas was on the ground now, panting as he recovered from the fight.

 

[twinkletide]

Namiko tried her best, shooting, even managing to seriously injure one of them; but ultimately she wasn't in tip-top shape herself, and so she could do nothing but watched as the chimera escaped.

After they'd gone Namiko fell back onto the floor, groaning. She was alive. She survived. Unfortunately, she wasn't so sure these wounds were worth it. But Lucas. Lucas was okay too. That was all that mattered.

Some time passed before Namiko managed to peel her body off the ground. She limped over to Lucas and smiled weakly at him. "Lucas..." she whispered. "Good job there...too bad they got away..." She moaned and fell onto her butt right beside him, clutching her wound. "Geez...guess we shouldn't put off seeing command..."

 

[Mahou-Shoujo]

Lucas was half sitting half laying against the wall at this point, he didn't have any particularly big wounds like Namiko's stab wound, but instead had dozens of smaller cuts and bruises all over his body, at least with his magical healing they probably wouldn't scar...
"Y..Yeah... Maybe they can send someone else to fight them... Talking chimera are really strong..."
Lucas declared as his transformation ended... Mostly? His hair hadn't changed back but Lucas didn't seem to be up to complaining right now, or have even noticed!

"Umm... Are you okay?"
He asked, looking to Namiko with clear concern in his eyes as he looked at the blood around where she had been stabbed, the wound had mostly closed already but still looked simply horrific.

 

[twinkletide]

Namiko peered down at her healing wound and smiled reassuringly. "It'll be fine. I've had worse." Which was true. "I should be asking the same for you. That was the most hits you've ever taken. Are you alright?" Temporarily Namiko got the impression that he hadn't transformed back, considering the length of his hair, but his school attire shot that down. "And...for that matter...did you grow out your hair?"

 

[Mahou-Shoujo]

"Hahh... Worse?... That sounds like it would have really hurt..."
He declared, looking even more worried now... He probably would have hugged her if it wouldn't have most likely ended up hurting them both, as well as maybe opening up wounds again...

"Heh... Yeah...I'm okay... Ouch... Well, that was a lie... But I will be okay".
Lucas assured before placing a hand on his head.
"Ehh?! What the... Why is my hair so long?! Is this from the transformation? I didn't know it could have side effects!"
Lucas declared, though now seemed to be more playing with the long hair than just feeling it.

 

[twinkletide]

"I...didn't know that either." Okay, this was really worrying. Life had all of a sudden gotten very strange; and when you hear the words 'strange' and 'magical girl' used in conjunction you know something is up. She furrowed her brow. They could ask command, but considering he might be the first male magical girl...she doubted it. Maybe they could run some tests.

Eventually Namiko was healed enough to stand. "Well, we'll...figure it out. Do you want to skip the rest of school or finish? We only have two periods left. Well...a period and a half, anyways."

 

[Mahou-Shoujo]

Hearing that side effects were not normal was far from calming for Lucas... But he didn't panic, a little hair growth was easily resolved and... Well it wasn't exactly unpleasant, there were so many things he could do with longer hair and it felt weirdly good on his head.
"Well... I guess it isn't that bad... Maybe I will keep it..."
He mumbled, twirling some hair now.

"I would rather just skip... At this point we are probably marked absent and if we go back to class together people might ask questions..."
He wasn't completely clueless at least, well... Actually he just thought they might have questions about the outfit he was wearing earlier... And the long hair...
"So i guess we should go to command?..."

 

[twinkletide]

Namiko placed her hand on his head. His hair was even smoother than usual, more luxurious. "Bingo. There's a back door over there. Let's go." They could go back for their stuff, but that would defeat the whole point of skipping, so she decided they'd just make an excuse later. They got out without difficulty and boarded the train after a short walk. On the ride Namiko fell asleep, exhausted, her head on Lucas's shoulders.

 

[Mahou-Shoujo]

Lucas actually moved into the hand on his head, while he had started out avoiding head pats, it seemed he now actively encouraged them... It looked like Namiko had converted him... Actually with how he had messed with his hair it almost looked like he had cat ears... Though they were clearly only made of hair rather than being some other weird side effect.

On the train it seemed Lucas had the same problem... And fell asleep... Waking only when the train announced they were at the last stop, a good couple of hours from where they had intended.
"Ehh?! Umm... Namiko... We fell asleep..."
He whispered, trying to shake her awake.

 

[twinkletide]

Namiko was jerked out of her dreamless sleep by Lucas's hands. She was almost reluctant to get up, seeing how soft Lucas's shoulder was. It took her a moment to realize what was happening, but once she did her eyes widened and she straightened out, looking around in confusion.

"Crap..." she said, rubbing her eyes. "Where are we?"