don't you mess with a little girl's dreams

Two weeks ago, a thing that was only doing a very poor job of pretending to be a woman crawled in through Nausicaa's window and raised its knife above her head and she screamed -

And her friend the boogieman tore it apart.

Nausicaa had been scared of him back then. It only made sense. But he seemed so lonely hiding under her bed, so she crawled down there - and kept crawling into the infinite shadows -

He seemed to need a hug, was all. And he did save her.

They've been best friends since, and Nausicaa's become more aware. Of the way Nanny doesn't seem to sleep - no actually she doesn't sleep - and seems to know a weird amount of things, and is always meeting with other Nannies outside in the dark...

Of how her friend Sue's sister died, and how it was probably way more horrible than what the adults told them. Which was nothing. How Sue now has a monster of her own, a skeletal thing (Nausicaa's glad she only needs to keep her boogieman from scaring people, not from eating people).

How there's something wrong with two of her teachers, and how her classmate Lianne has something weird in her family and people are following Silvie around who shouldn't be -

She's also become aware that she probably made her friend the boogieman. Three weeks ago, she saw a fox's skeleton, half decayed, and convinced herself it was going to follow her home and haunt her -

So, naturally, it did.

And now the rain-monster who brought the drowning dreams touched her boogieman and changed him, and he's weird lately and his shadows keep dripping, and maybe if she believed him she can believe very hard in someone who'll fix him -

A magical girl, obviously. Someone who will fight for truth and justice and humanity. Someone who can look into people's hearts and bring out their true selves. Someone who'll help because there's something horrible in this town and none of the adults want to know -

Nausicaa sits on her bed, scrunches up her face, and believes very, very hard.

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The Crone

within-yourself

"I'd encourage you to do that. I don't really have any connections in those communities myself - they're likely seeing an entirely different picture of things than us."

slumber-and-disaster

"Sounds good."

She has some time to kill, then. Maybe a walk around town.

standing-at-the-crossroads

Nothing interesting, nothing interesting...

A girl about Nausicaa's age setting a winged wooden statue on fire and laughing!

slumber-and-disaster

That is interesting.

"Hello?" Makoto calls.

standing-at-the-crossroads

" - Oh, hello!" the girl calls, half turning to look at Makoto, though she keeps the demon (currently flopping around weakly) in her line of sight.

slumber-and-disaster

"Having fun?"

standing-at-the-crossroads

"Yes! I've decided I quite like fire for this."

slumber-and-disaster

"It does tend to be the most effective way to burn things."

standing-at-the-crossroads

"It is! Fire's very useful like that!"

slumber-and-disaster

"Don't you have a school to be in right now, though?"

standing-at-the-crossroads

"Maybe... This is more fun, though."

slumber-and-disaster

"I can see how it might be! Do you run across a lot of demons?"

standing-at-the-crossroads

"Yeah, but I go looking."

slumber-and-disaster

"Any particular reason you do that?"

standing-at-the-crossroads

"I got my Angel, and he doesn't like demons, so I'm helping! And also people think it's creepy when they see someone my age setting moving things on fire and laughing. The aesthetic is very important!"

slumber-and-disaster

"I think I met your Angel yesterday."

standing-at-the-crossroads

"Huh! I'm still figuring out his language... Though I think he met someone new during school last time. Was that you?"

slumber-and-disaster

"Probably. We fought off a pack of demons with the wendigo."

standing-at-the-crossroads

"That sounds fun! The wendigo is cool, though I don't think she's enjoying herself..."

slumber-and-disaster

"She's not having a great time, no."

standing-at-the-crossroads

"I don't think I'd want to be a wendigo," she confides. "Everyone would be scared of me but not for the right reasons. I don't wanna look scary, I wanna be scary."

slumber-and-disaster

"What would you want to be?"

standing-at-the-crossroads